TRAMS COLLIDE

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLV, Issue 21216, 10 December 1938, Page 8

TRAMS COLLIDE

Motorman Injured Extensive Damage “Safety First” Slogans Bv Telegraph—Pres? Association CHRISTCHURCH, December 9. While the City Council's traffic department’s safety week procession was in progress this afternoon, a tram with a trailer attached crashed into the back of a trailer attached to another tram which had stopped in Ferry Road near Monica Park. Both trams were carrying safety first slogans on banners. Fortunately there were not many passengers on either tram, and although considerable damage was done to the vehicles, only one person was injured. This was the motorman of the second tram, and his injuries were not serious. The 2.10 pan. tram for Sumner stopped at a regular stopping place to set down a woman passenger. She was in the act of alighting when the 2.14 p.m. tram for Woolston crashed into the rear of the trailer which was attached to the Suhner tram. The woman escaped injury. The conductor, who was standing on the platform of the trailer of the Sumner car, saw the other car coming and realising that an accident was inevitable, jumped off just in time to avoid serious injury because the empty trailer was telescoped. The motorman of the Woolston tram received painful facial injuries and suffered severely from shock. The force of the impact was so great that the stationary Sumnerbound car and trailer were pushed a chain beyond the stopping place. Passengers in the Sumner car received a severe shaking, but there was no panic. All four vehicles were badly damaged, particularly the trailer on the Sumner car. The whole of the rear of this vehicle was' stove in, and the road was littered with broken glass and splintered timber. The tramway authorities had breakdown equipment on the scene almost immediately, and in less than an hour all wreckage was cleared away. Traffic was not interfered witn because the stop was on a loop. The injured motorman was taken to the Christchurch Hospital by a passing motorist, and early in the evening he was discharged as an out-patient.