ANOTHER RAILWAY DISASTER.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2176, 15 February 1881, Page 3

ANOTHER RAILWAY DISASTER.

A telegram to tho San Francisco papers dated Omaha, January 4th, says : —A terrible accident happened this morning, between ten and eleven o’clock, on the Nebraska Division of the Chicago, St Paul and Omaha Railway, resulting in the death of six men and the wounding of one. The scene of the accident was a deep-curved cut about 800 feet long, about one mile south of the Middle Creek sidetrack. This cut, a few days ago, was blown full of snow, and had been cleaned out sufficiently to allow trains to go through, but they still had some trouble, the north-bound passenger train having got stuck there yesterday. This morning a working train and a gang of over twenty men, under Conductor Cams, were sent out from Oakland to work at tho cut and shovel tho snow upon Aat oars, to haul it out and widen the passageway for trains. The snow on each side is as high as the passenger coaobes, and has been cut oat in the shape of a trough, caoh side slanting slightly and terminating close to the rails. About half-past ten o’clock, the south-bound passenger train, bound from Irvington to Omaha, came along at tho rate of twenty miles an hour, and upon approaching the cut, got under greater headway, so as to make the run clear through. When within about 200 feet of the south end of the cut, the engineer felt the engine strike and run over something. He had seen nothing, as loose snow was flying in clouds in front of and over the engine, but he immediately whistled down brakes, and came to a stop as soon as possible about 400 feet south of the mouth of the cut. Immediately upon stopping the train a man was found caught on the forward trucks of the forward oar next to tho engine, he having been carried all the way there. He was extricated from his position. He was found to be dead. His clothes were all torn to pieces, and he was cut, mangled and bruised is a horrible manner. He was laid aside temporarily, and upon going back into the out, four more dead men and two wounded men were found lying on the track and each side of it. One of the wounded men was just breathing his last, and was taken into one of the cars, where he died in a few minutes. He bad both legs out off, and was literally torn to pieces. The other wounded man had one of bis ankles so badly out that he will have to have it amputated. His head was also badly bruised. The other four men who had been killed presented a terrible sight. Their arms and legs were broken and crushed, and their heads and faces bruised, wounded, and bleeding. The survivor, and the man who died just after being found, were brought down to Oakland on the passenger train. The survivor was taken to his boarding house, and the body of the other man deposited in the depot, where it was recognised by his friends. The other flve bodies were put on a working train, which was run down to Oakland with them. It seems that these seven men had gone into the cut to shovel snow, and probably thought there was room enough for them to stand on the side of the track and let the train pass, and therefore thought nothing of it, for there were no signals at the north end of the cut to stop the passenger train or to indicate that there was any danger ahead. Exactly how they came to be caught has not yet been learned, as the passengers and some of the train men who arrived hero to-night did not know that any accident had happened until after the train had stopped. There was nothing on the pilot of the engine to show that the pilot had canght them. The probability is that the train, coming around the curve suddenly, caught them unawares, and then they jumped to each side, and were either knocked down by the engine cylinder, or were pulled under by the strong suction caused by the train moving so rapidly through such a narrow passage way.