LEVEL CROSSING ACCIDENT

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXI, Issue 19050, 1 July 1924, Page 5

LEVEL CROSSING ACCIDENT

MOTOR CRASHES INTO TRAIN. FIVE PERSONS INJURED. (Per Press Association). ASHBURTON, June 30. A serious accident occurred at an Ashburton level crossing at 7 o’clock on Saturday night, when a motor-car occupied by five residents of Ashburton crashed into a train from Christchurch. The occupants were removed to hospital. They were: Charles Ward, carrier, fractured pelvis, fracture of base of skull and abrasions; his condition is serious. I. Fallwell, Court bailiff, married, lacerated head. J. P. Cossgrove, boot salesman, single, lacerated ear. H. Davis, upholsterer, married, wounds on head. George Melville, apprentice, aged 16 years, internal haemorrhage, deep cut in thigh, wound on the head, two fingers on left hand crushed; condition dangerous. The party was returning from a football match at Methven, the car being driven by the owner, Mr. Coss- < grove. They proceeded on to the crossing near the station yards at the same time as the train, which they apparently did not see, was approaching. The driver had given the usual warnings, but seeing the car intended to come on, he applied the. emergency brakes. It was too late to avert an accident, and the car hit the fourth waggon from the engine, and was reduced to a mass of wreckage. The axle box of the waggon was smashed. Young Melville, who was working at Methven, was getting a lift home for the week-end. He was thrown on to the cattle stops. Fallwell, Davis, and Cossgrove have been discharged from-hospital.