HEAVY RAIN IN NORTH

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24772, 24 November 1941, Page 6

HEAVY RAIN IN NORTH

TRAIN SERVICES DISORGANISED TEMPORARY BREAK IN LINE (P.A.) WELLINGTON, Nov. 23, The train services between Wellington and Manawatu, including the Main Trunk expresses, were badly disorganised yesterday owing to a washout at Shannon. The Levin races were postponed till to-morrow' because of heavy rain on Friday night, which one farmer be* tween Levin and Shannon says constituted the heaviest fall experienced in the locality in his experience of 50 years. It was raining heavily round -Shannon and Levin on Thursday. With the ground already heavily soaked, .the flood waters on Friday night collected faster than the drainage could carry them away. About half a mile on the Palmerston side of Shannon a section of the railway line is carried on a low trestle bridge. It.showed signs of weakening-early, on, .Saturday, morning. Trains, passed over, it slowly* but the flood triumphed about L, & o'clock, the concrete supports becoming undermined, and a complete break occurring over a chain in length. The limited from Auckland, then already late, was stopped at the washout and the passengers transferred from Makerua to Shannon, where a relief train received them. By this morning the line had been reopened. Traffic to-day was normal, except for a speed restriction over the place where the line had been repaired.