TRAGIC SMASH

Stratford Evening Post, Issue 79, 29 June 1928, Page 5

TRAGIC SMASH

KAIL WAV COLLISION.

.EXCURSION TRAIN WREOK|EI).

MANY. PASSENGERS KILLED AND ■ . 'INJURED.

United /Press Assn. —By Electric ■Telegraph: Copyright, f r ' - LONDON, June 28. Twenty-two were killed when a crowded excursion train from Scarborough to- Newcastle collided with a. goods/train outside Darlington station just before midnight. Two 'coaches were telescoped and there were some distressing scenes. Twenty-two were killed and forty seven ipjpred, states the NorthEastern Cwnpany. Twenty of those Injiired have since been released from hospital.,. *. • • / The disaster was far more serious than at first reported. ■ The collision occurred at 11120, but many hohfs elapsed before it was possible’ to extricate the bodies. Salirage is still proceeding. The- scene of'the disaster is three hundred ' yards south of Darlington station. 'Owing to the Newcastle races the wfeek is regarded as a holiday on the Tynside, so the excursion train had at least 500 passengers, ; . who. were qrowded into the ten corridor coaches. The train was not scheduled to stop at Darlington, but approached the station slowly. ■

As It ' came to the Darlington south crossing an engine left the station with /a van for shunting purposes. Into this the excursion k dashed, the passenger engine being hurled aside... The shunting van resembled 'a -crumpled cigarette box. The > electric lights instantly went out, but 'it Was plain that passengers in the two Coaches were shockingly matigled. Cries and groans yrere heard in the darkness, which broken Qnly by the flame and smoke belching from the engines, these apparently being afire. '■/■B,ows of seats were crushed on top of each other, with broken hujnans between. Arms and legs hanging by threads of skin dangled over the sides of seats. Many of the injured were women and children, whose cries for were pitiable. The yescufers 'were at first unable to do anything, but mitigate the worst of the horrors, though they assisted*, thfrvruninjured. passengers to 1 crawl from' the 1 wreckage. Further frantic efforts- to hack and pjdse up the woodwork released others the feast hujrt. The third coach of the passenger train had telescoped into th e second. Men used saws and axes in older to cut into the wreckage. A breakdown crane was. on the scene within . twenty minutes/ The Darlington fire brigade and residents who were aroused from their sleep assisted the railway gangsmen, but rescue was al * to ° slow and doctors administered morphia, to fortify the sufferers during the ordeal .of being extricated.