BIG WATER MAIN BURSTS

Hokitika Guardian, 18 December 1930, Page 5

BIG WATER MAIN BURSTS

DISLOCATION OF TRAFFIC. SERIOUS DAMAGE OCCURS IN LONDON. (Official Wireless.) (Received this day at 1.5 p.m.) RUGBY, Dec. 1,3. Severe dislocation of traffic both in the streets and the underground railway and serious damage to business property, besides interruption of the telephone and electric light services in the immediate district, were mused by the bursting of a 24-inch water main at the corner of Oxford .Street and Tottenham Court Road this morning, just as city workers were arriving from the suburbs. The flood forced up the wooden paring blocks, spreading in «H directions and poured into the basements of buildings and down the elevators to the Tube station platforms, where the water was soon some feet deep. Ihe extent of the damage cannot yet le estimated, but it is feared that the foundaions of the roadway and the superstructure of the l ndergi omul station will l>e affected.

Shops on the whole are anticipating heavy losses in, Christinas trade. The gas main explosion of two ymirs ago. when main streets were closed for months, occurred a few hundred yards from, the scene ol to-oav’s accident. It is expected that. Underground services will l>c norm til to-morrow.