Train Disaster.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIIC, Issue 14153, 12 March 1910, Page 4 (Supplement)

Train Disaster.

PLUNGE INTO RIVER

HORRIBLE DEATHS. On Friday evening, January 21st, says a New;. York cable message, a terrib'e railway disaster occurred in Canada to the'express between Montreal and Minneapolis, in which between fifty and sixty people lost their lives and close on 100 were injured. Even now it is not possible to get at the full extent of tlie disaster . or_ the exact figures of the dead and injured, because a blizzard sprang up jcsturday which rendered the recovery of the bodies almost impossible. The train, which contained about 200 passengers, was composed of seven cars, including a Pullman sleeper, a first-class dining car, a colonist car, arid a second-class car.. When forty miles west of Sudbury, in West- 1 ern Ontario, where the Soult Ste. Marie Branch j<)fns the Canadian Pacific main line, the colonist car and the dining car jumped the track and crashed through a. bridge over the Spanish River, falling on to the ice-bound stream and- sinking in the freezing waters. The Pullman car was rolled down the embankment, at the edge of the bridge, while tht- rest of the train was derailed, but remained practically intact. The occupants in the colonist car were in the most pitiable condition. and it was here that the loss of life was the greatest. The occupants struggled frantically to escape, but the few who managed to null themselves through the windows of the submerged car found themselves in the freezing water, which paralysed their energies, and some of them were drowned. The dining car had fallen in such a position that- some of it was standing out of the water, though the latter reached nearly to the ceiling. Here the chief waiter, a man named Reynolds, with great presence of mind shouted to the diners, of whom the car was full, to keep their heads above water and ta cling to the ventilators. He then dived down and made his way ouc through one of the broken . windows, and, pulling himself to the roof -of the car, managed to rescue three passengers by assisting them through the ventilators. Yvith their helii he then broke a hole in the roof, and altogether eight were taken oiit of the diner. Before others could he rescued, however, the car. which had taken fire alpiost immediately after the, accident, flamed so fien~etv that the survivors clinging t-o the hat racks inside were either incinerated or, letting; go their hold; sank back into the car and were drowned. The brave Reynolds stayed on the'roof as long as possible \mtil be was driven away by the flames. It is undoubtedly due to him that anv lives were saved out of the tlining car. The Pullman on the shore also took fire, and as it was impossible to extinguish the flames it is feared that two or three passengers who were unable to be extricated from the wreck were burned to death. The survivors and trainmen worked with passionate eagerness. but they wore too few in number. and appliances were wanting. The sufferings of the injured were terrible in the extreme, because, in addition to their hurts, the temperature was below zero, and their clothing, like that of their rescuers, was frozen stiff on their bodies. It was hours before any medical or surgical relief could be brought to them. When assistance arrived from Sudbury and Sault Ste. Marie and other neighbouring places that could be moved were taken to the hospitals and the hotels of the nearest ulaces. The work of recovering the bodies has been continued all yesterday and to-day, but under supreme difficulties. A wind, amounting almost to a blizzard, prevailed all yesterday, and the temperature fell to 20deg. below zero. During a lull in operations the river was entirely frozen over again, absolutely obliterating all evidence of the sunken cars and their freight of dead bodies. It was necessary to cut ■ through the ice to continue operations, and the divers almost succumbed from the intense cold. Up to now only eleven bodies have been recovered, and it is believed that fully forty more are still in the submerged cars. The cause of the disaster is not yet known, though the railway officials declare that it was not duo to a i loose or broken rail. ! One of the unidentified dead is a j priest.