RAILWAY ACCIDENTS AND LOSSES.

Oamaru Mail, Volume I, Issue 127, 16 September 1876, Page 2

RAILWAY ACCIDENTS AND LOSSES.

The railway companies had to meet some unusually heavy compensation cases in 1875, and the aggregate disbursements on account of personal injury and damages and losses of property appear to have been very little short of £650,000 for the year. The passenger claims in proportion to the receipts were much heavier than the goods claim, the percentage paid on the former having been I*so, while on the latter it was *B7 only of the receipts. While the payment of many thousands had scarcely any effect on the revenue of the larger lines, there were cases among the smaller companies where the .cost of even a single accident produced disastrous results. For instance, the " London, Tilbury, and Southern had to pay no less than £14,060 for personal injury, being one-third of the entire passenger receipts, in the December half-year 'alone. Among other heavy cases, we may mention the Great Eastern, which lost nearly four per cent.' of the passenger receipts ; and -the London, Chatham, and the Lancashire and Yorkshire, about two and a half per cent, each. These, and the London and NorthWestern,7. North-Eastern, and Sheffield Companies," lost in each case an amount equivalent to half per cent, of dividend on their ordinary stock. .