THE WAIEARAPA RAILWAY ACCIDENT.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2571, 4 July 1882, Page 4

THE WAIEARAPA RAILWAY ACCIDENT.

[HUM ABIOOIAXIOH THLEdSAM.J WELLINGTON, July 3. The following particulars ol Saturday's nilway accident are furnished by the " Post " :—After leaving Kaitoke, the descent ol! the first steep gradient of 1 in 40 we.b commenced at a very steady pace, the brake in the rear of tbo van beiog put partly on to koep the coupling extended and the buffers apart, bo as so avoid the risk of " buckling." The passenger cars wera at the rear of the bain next to the van. Almost immediately after passing the twenty-eix mile post, marly a mile from Kaitoke, the sixth and neventh waggons from the engines left the rails. Ihey neemed almost to drop off, leaving the metals quite quietly, and without anv aliook. The guard, however, aotioed the ocaurrencs and turned tho brake hard on. The pe-ssengera in the front o image also seeing what had happened put on the platform brake of that vehicle. The result was to cause the train to drag so muoh as to arouse the attention of the engine driver, n'ho was unable to see the hinder part of his train. He remarked to the fireman that they were losing time, aid told him to take off his Brake, supposing that it was on, as is often necessary when descending so steep a gradient irith such a heavy train. The firoman, however, replied that it was off already. In the meanwhile the derailed waggons weve runring along the balla3t and bumping ovtr "the sleepers, but owing to the extension of the couplings through the weight of the heavy angina in front, and the brake being on behind, the shocks were not communicated to the other vehicles. At length, at a particular part of the five-ohain curve,, where the train emerged from the cutting o:a to the top of a high embankment, the couplings of the front derailed truok broke with the extreme tension, and both waggons were intat.tly preoipitated ovor the side of the l*nk, the timber and firewood with which they were laden being scattered far and wide. The tracks himg by their rear couplings, which still held. The shook pulled the next tiro trucks off the rai.li?, but fortunately the remainder of tho train remained firm, in spite of the sharp tideway pull, and the brakes prevented it from running forward. Directly the coupling iron broke, the -engine with five trucks which remained attached to it being relieved from the former drag, made a sudden plunge forward and this warned the driver that some mishap had taken piece. He Accordingly stopped the engine very promptly, the powerful breaks with which the FiiHisa are furnished enabling this to be done with graat quiokneo. He then waa jible 6o discover what happened. The debris 'being cleared away, the rest of the train was able to continue its journey after a delay iif about an hour. Nobody was injured. The irolling stock is hardly at all damaged beyond 'the breaking of the couplings. Had not those lOODplings broken, however the connequenca must have been most disastrous, for l;ho train would almost immediately have entered a tunnel, when tha derailed waggona would have been hurled against the faoing wall, and the remainder of the train, including the passenger carriages, would have crashed into the wreok, probably with fatal results. On a jareful examination of the rails and rolling itook the former wore found to be striotly in gang a, and tha latter were in per fecit order, and indeed tha trucks whioh had run off had :aeir wheels.