AMAZING SIGHT

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 31, 6 February 1931, Page 14

AMAZING SIGHT

HOTEL CUT IN TWO

Perhaps one of the most amazing pictures is to be seen at the Grand Hotel in Hastings—a five-storied brick structure. Here the earthquake has cut clean' through the building from roof to basement, leaving all the rooms exposed with their furniture intact. A great fissure was shown down the cen- j tro of the hotel, and a guard on the roadway keeps too venturesome onlookers clear of potential trouble. If the hotel does not collapse it will have to be pulled down. DRAMATIC INCIDENT. A chemist's shop right in the main Btreet in Napier collapsed in a_ pilo of wood and corrugated iron, and six hours afterwards a man could be heard groaning in the ruins. Immediately an army of willing workers commenced with axes and crowbars to haul away the fallen timbers, so as •to release him. The death roll was biggest in the brick buildings, and the damage to these is colossal. A curious sight in Hastings testifying to the suddenness of the calamity was to see cars in the main street completely wrecked under the showers of masonry and timber. No fewer than five of these cars were to bo seen in the. streets. WOODFOKD AND lONA. News from Haveloek tvaa to the effect that the town suffered badly, but

that the two big girls' colleges, lona and Woodford House, wero not so seriously damaged as was expected. Outwardly at least they appeared to be intact. 1 THE FREEZING WORKS. Threo hundred men in the Whakatu freezing works are still wondering how it is they are still alive. The upheaval wrecked one of the main walls, which fell right out, but the other held, and they wore all able to get away safely. It is reported that three were killed at the Paki Paid works. The big lime works near Hastings were badly wrecked.