TERRIFIC EXPLOSION OF GUNPOWDER.

Grey River Argus, Volume IX, Issue 689, 18 June 1870, Page 2 (Supplement)

TERRIFIC EXPLOSION OF GUNPOWDER.

The Anglo-Brazilian Times, of the sth of February, give 3 the- following account of a disastrous explosion of 360 tons of gunpowder at Oerrito :— " On the 2nd of January the Brazilian schooner. Pluto had finished receiving a cargo of powder from the pontoon Quickstep, and was still alongside, awaiting the ' return of the captain, who had gone ashore to receive his orders before leaving for Rio. On board the Pluto were a crew of eight persons, the captain's wife and daughter, and nine men from.the arsenal, who' were" doing some repairs. It being breakfast, time, no one was on board the pontoon and her tender or at the shore magazine. ' At 11 a.m. three almost simultaneous detonations were heard arising from the explosion of the Pluto^ the' pontoon, and the shore magazine, containing in the three about 360 tons of gunpowder; According to the account of the captain of the monitor Alagoas, who was on deck at the time, the Pluto blew up first, then the pontoon, and lastly the shore magazine. All three were blown to fragments, and pf the nineteen persons on board the Pluto, hot a fragment could be found by the searching parties. A tender of the pontoon, which was lying near the magazine, also disappeared ; an old pontoon, hauled ashore about half a mile off, rolled over into the river and sank ; a bomb flat boat lying a mile away, was submerged by the wave 3 ; and several of the buildings of the arsenal suffered much injury. A private account says, the Schooner's anchor was found at the other side of the isle, and that the woods about the scene of the explosion . were levelled f or d considerable distance and for a further distance the trees were shattered and torn* by snlinters and fragments of beams. : At the magazine a hole of 60ft in 'diameter; and 15ft- was formed. A great 11 u mber of birds were. Pilled, and a large quantity of dead' and stunned fish were cast ashorb ; for a long way below. Some damage was 'done to the monitors Para^ Alagoas j and Ceafp, The cause of the explosion remain^ .unknown, ftnd the captain of the Pluto say a that before he went on shore the hatchways were 'dbsed and covered witli tarpaulins,' and the deck washed." < : ! ;