MANY PASSENGERS INJURED.

Colonist, Volume LV, Issue 13735, 29 May 1913, Page 5

MANY PASSENGERS INJURED.

60MB MIRACULOUS ESCAPES.

[United Press Association.]

i Auckland, May 28. A passenger1 train from Henderson - and a train irom Auckland, collidod i on tbo railway bridge at New .bynn at b.50 •this morning. T\v« carriages were toleMcoped and botli engines wore- badly damaged. The facts so far as ascertained indicate that tho signals wero obscured by heavy fog, tuid.woro not visible until tlio train was right upon them. The driver of the Henderson; train on observing tho danger, signal promptly applied tho brakes, with the '.result that tiie passengers were thrown, out of their seats. , i Tho rails were very greasy on tlio; steep, jjrade, being covered with irost, - and tho tram kept on a good speed.un- ■ til it crashed into a train from Auek- j land. Tho latter had gone up tho line to sido track, and before it could return the collision occurred on the mid- j ■ die of tho -Now Lynn bridge. Tho engines collided head-on, and ifeoth were badly broken up. Tho first carriage of tho Henderson train was not damaged, but tho next .two were, completely telescoped, and were- crumpled up like a concertina. Both carriages left tho railway lines, • and wexo hanging over the side or the bridge. , The next two'carnages had the win■dows broken. The rear carnages escaped. . On tho other train, a 6 showing xhe force of the impact, tho buffers for almost the whole length1 of the tram vvoro knocked into one" another. Stone, a resident of Oratea, was very badly injured, and conveyed to tlio hospital, and a railway employee named Thomas ,a fireman on one of the engines, was also very badly hurt. There were only 70 passengers on the trains in collision. Twenty wero in the first carriage of the Henderson train, and were, with one exception, severely cut and bruised. Tho second and third carriages, which were telescoped, had only two passengers. One of them, Stone, was extricated from tho wreckage of tho third ■carriage, with difficulty. The second passenger, Farrell, had a marvellous escape-. Tho third carriage was crumplwl up into rv space of four feet. The side, bursting out,.wenjb over the side of tho ; bridge, and fell into the water 50 feet below. ■ Tho bridge on which the trains collided it; 40 feet long. One train had been taking in. water at New Lynn, and was backing on the. side- track to let the other (the- passenger train) pass, when tho latter appeared coming down the hill round a curve. Both engine-drivers jammed on the ■brakes, but it was.impossible,to avert a serious'and head-on collision. The two 45-ton engines met with a terrific impact, and overy one of the eight cars in the passenger train bears ■evidence of tho force- of tlio collision. Immediately there was a scene of wild excitement. Half-a-dozen men and women wero carried out unconscious. One doctor living in the vicinity was promptly in attendance, and another was soon on the scene. One indication of the force of the impact was that two sleepers on the bridge were cut right through and the railway line badly dented. Farroll's. account of his escape provides sensational reading. "It makes me shudder to look at it," he said, while standing on the embankment at the sid* of the bridge. '"I can't for tho life of me make out h^v T got clear. The first. I kwv: ->•' -~v.y--thing unusual was tit the 'xmk! .". iV.v chains before reaching tho brH^:\ The Westinghouso brake went on wry suddenly, and jolted the train so much that I was lifted off the seat, and thrown forward. I had no sooner recovered when a terrible crash occurred. f was dashed to tho floor; there was a groat crunching of timber, and as I looked up I saw the buffers and floor of the carriage ahead shooting over tho top of mo. Although I felt that my end had como, I decided to make a last oft'ort. Groping for the door at the ■roar of the carriage, I managed to crawl from among the heap of splintered timber and broken glass, whilo the mo to a dividing corridor beyond the me to a divding corridor beyond tho door. I was almost in tho act of jumping for my life to the creek below when the -smashing seemed to coase. I scrambled down to tho sleepers on the- bridge The train was at a standstill and the passengers all around inquiring after anyone- who might have been in the telescoped car. I don't know what happened then, bceauso I lost my lvrad lor about '20 mimybes — '.like- a good many moro who were in tho pjuivsh. •'.Not a scratch," was Farrell's reply ■to -n inquiry as to whether ho was tnirtjbut he- was very shaky.