Later Particulars.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXX, Issue 376, 23 April 1908, Page 4

Later Particulars.

The list of killed is not yet available, but the latest from the scene is that four bodies have been recovered, while sixty injured have been officially recorded. The Stationmaster at Sunshine says he was the only one on duty at the station. He had set the points for the Ballarat train to come into the station, and the points remained set in that way. He was busy attending to the despatch of the Ballarat train, and he had no time to alter the points, even if he had desired. Consequently the points stood against the Bendigo train, the driver of which disregarded the signals, with the result that the train ran over the points, and smashed into the Ballarat train, the cars of which were demolished. That the train contained about 120 passengers. The driver (Milburn) who was on the engine attached to the Bendigo train, stated when he noticed the signals were against him the Westiughouse brake refused, to act. He then reversed the engine, but she did not respond immediately. Then the collision occurred. Had the Ballarat train got away to time the accident would never have happened. It was about 45 minutes late.

The noise of the colliiiou was so great that the whole neighbourhood was aroused. The platform was quite dark, and it was impossible for the uninjured passengers, as they rushed up and down, to avoid trampling or tumbling over the dead and wounded. When the first ambulance train arrived it brought out Dr Percy and a corps of railway ambulance workers, who provided first aid requisites. As their lanterns began to flit about the platform, a terrible scene was displayed of gruesome horror. The bodies of men and women, with features battered beyond recognition, and their limbs mangled, lay about the platform. One corpse with the head completely torn off lay close by the mangled body of a mother with her baby clasped in her arms. The body of a man was hanging up between two of the carriages in a position where for a long time the workers could do nothing to extricate it. It was with the greatest difficulty that many of the bodies could be extricated at all, as they were impaled on the ends of sharp splintered woodwork. A number of the injured are likely to succumb.