THE TRAIN-RACING MANIA.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5667, 11 September 1896, Page 2

THE TRAIN-RACING MANIA.

ACCIDENT TO THE SCOTCH EXPRESS. * HOW IT HAPPENED. [From Our Correspondent. I LONDON, Jult 17 That the racing expresses which form: such an attractive feature of the run froin 1 London to Scotland would sooner rather' than later meet with a murderous mishap and kill a trainload of passengers, was my deliberately expressed opinion this time last year. And now the prediction haß been veriSed. Fortunately, however, the accident occurred not to a crowded mail in August, but to an almost empty Sunday night train in July. But for that the holocaust would have been awful. And the point to 'specially note is that, barring the high Bpeed, none' of the experts can give a reason for the 1 catastrophe. The express was tearing along' at fifty miles an hour, when without •apparent rhyme or reason it suddenly derailed. According even to official accounts the disaster seems quite unaccountable. The Scotch express, drawn by two heavy' engines, left Euston at eight punctually on Sunday night for Aberdeen, which it is J timed to reach at 6.36 next morning. All' went well till midnight, wlieH PVttston was' passed. It had just run 105 MILES IN 105 MINUTES, and slowed down a bit, but all the signalswere fair, and the engine-drivers were pre*paring for another rapid run. Suddenly, a strange thing happened. The leading engine glided off the rails,, the socond locomotive followed, and in a moment the ' whole of the enormously lieavy train waßploughing its way through the loose per--manent way of a siding, at the end of. which was an embankment some 2oft above' the level of the highway. Had thedrivers ; lost their nerve, the train would inevitably' have gone over the embankment, and been 1 so completely wrecked that it is doubtful' whether one passenger would have escaped' death or terrible injury. Happily the drivers 1 retained their presence of : mind, and stoutly sticking to their posts were able to bring the whole of the powerful brake 1 power to bear upon the train, and being aided to some extent by the clogging of the wheels by some soft ground, the train, despite its weight and vast momentum, was brought to a standstill wiEhin a distance of about eighty yards from the point of derailment. The engines and the leading coaches were badly damaged, the latter, in fact, being quite wrecked as far as woodwork and lighter fittings were concerned, but the steel frames stood the tremendous strain remarkably 'well, and the carriages did not telescope, thanks to the great strength of their construction. To these various causes must be attributed THK MARVELLOUS FACT that only one passenger was lolled, and ' that the injuries of the few that were hurt at all are said to be of a comparatively trifling character. The man killed was Donald Mavor, twenty years of age, who who was ou his way to Aberdeen to visit Mr William M'Lean, prior to sailing for Australia. He was at the moment of the disaster alone and asleep in ...the leading third-class coach. This was completely wrecked, and Mayor must have met with a merciful, because instantaneous, death. The Wreckage* of the demolished conch' held him fast, and his body, terribly mangled, was extricated ■with much difficulty. One of the company's employes who witnessed the accident from a distance has given it as his opinion that the first engine caught one of the points, and fouling the rail, jumped the metals, the succeeding engine and coaches following. A fortunate and extraordinary circumstance is the fact that the foremost engine was brought to, a standstill when within a yard of the brow of the embankment. .