SIX MEN KILLED.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XXXVI, Issue 7720, 16 May 1916, Page 3

SIX MEN KILLED.

BY EXPLOSION AT OHAKUNE. (Per Press Association). WELLINGTON, Last night. The secretary of the General Postoffice to-night received a telegram from the postmaster at Ohakune stating that an explosion had occurred in the Public Works quarry at Ohakune, resulting in six ihen being killed and two injured. The names of the dead are:—Mellsop, Larking, Davies, McGarry, Torrens and McKay (? McCall).* The injured are Sheehy and Morgan. FURTHER DETAILS. A MYSTERIOUS AFFAIR. WELLINGTON, This day. It is understood that the explosion in the tunnel near Ohakune occurred at 5.30 yesterday afternoon. The quarry belongs to the Railway Department. The Public Works Department is at present building a railway from Ohakune to Raetihi, and as a good deal of material is required for ballasting purposes the Department obtained the right to take metal from the quarry in question, and were working it at the time of the explosion. The practice in getting out metal is to drive a tunnel into the face of the rock, and put in a heayy charge of explosive so as to bring down from 800 to 1000 tons from the fage. In the present case it is stated the tunnel had been driven and the men had taken explosives in. There were in all eight men in the tunnel at the time of the explosion, Mellsop being with them. No theory can be advanced at present for the cause of the explosion. Mellsop and two others were blown clean out of the tunnel.