FLOODS IN FRANCE

Southland Times, Issue 17679, 17 June 1914, Page 6

FLOODS IN FRANCE

A BIG THUNDERSTORM. GAPS IN THE ROADS. SOME LIVES LOST. By Telegraph.—Press Assn-—Copyright. PARIS, June 16. Received June 16, 11.30 p.m. The worst thunderstorm for fifty years with a torrential downpour of rain has occurred, lasting two and a-half hours. Several sewers burst and the subsidence caused a hole of 150 square yards and 40 feet deep in the Place St. Phillppe. At Duroule a crowd was standing under an awning, and fifteen were whirled in the flood and momentarily engulfed, five being drowned. Yawning gaps 10 feet across appeared in many roads which collapsed into the excavations for an electric • underground railway, some 50 feet deep. A motor-bus fell into one, killing a number of passengers. Two • taxi cabs fell 30 feet into a hole, killing three people. Several buildings collapsed and many cellars are flooded. The gas mains exploded, blowing up the pavement. The electricity failed on the underground railway in the Place de Concorde and the passengers became panic stricken. A similar panic occurred In the street, where a wild rush was made for the escape. Even the police fled. The damage to Paris nil! cost half a million sterling. The storm struck a building whicti was being constructed at Choisy-le-Roi, where twenty masons were working. Taro were killed and eight seriously injured. It is believed that thirty others may be found beneath the debris of the Metropolitan railway, which collapsed in various places.