TRAIN DERAILED

Wairarapa Age, 23 March 1929, Page 5

TRAIN DERAILED

ACCIDENT TO MANAWATU MAIL. | FOUR CARRIAGES AND VAN LEAVE RAILS. THREE PASSENGERS SEVERELY CUT AND BRUISED. WELLINGTON, March 22. As the Palmerston North-Wel-lington mail train was approaching Pukema Bay at about 6.10 pan. today, the tyre of a wheel of one of the carriages broke, and four carriages and the guard’s van left the rail Two ladies and a man, all bound from Levin to Paremata, were severely cut and bruised, but all the other passengers escaped with nothing worse than minor bruises and a shaking. Those injured were: Mrs. S. Wallace, ' Miss Margaret Wallace and Mr. A. - S. Wallace. The part of the train remaining on < the rails continued, the postal van. being used to carry the injured, and arrived at Plimmerton, the next stop past Pukerua Bay, at 8.50. The Limited, bound from Wellington to Auckland, was delayed at Thorndon, but the line was clear at 0 p.m., and it then proceeded. The guard states that the passenger car with the damaged wheel was second in front of the guard’s van and it and the cars on either side and the van were pullo4 off. The derailed section ran 40 feet down a slope to the beach, the guard’s van becoming detached and turning upside down. The train came to a standstill with some of the derailed carriages on their sides and the last one resting on the beck below. There was a surprising absence of panic and only a few doors had to be forced to release the passengers. “The passengers took the mishap in a merry spirit. They lit bon fires on the beach and turned the whole affair into a jolly picnic,” said the guard. Officials state that the train was running to time and at its usual speed. The train was carrying thirty passengers. An official explained that such an accident as a rim leaving the wheel was rare.—(PA..)