FATAL EXPLOSION.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 2654, 3 November 1923, Page 3

FATAL EXPLOSION.

AT PORT AHURIRT. ONE KILLED, SEVERAL INJURED. Napier, Thursday. While moving some cylinders containing dissolved acetylene on the Jnll wharf at Port Ahuriri, at about two o’clock this afternoon, a man accidentally allowed one to strike another with some force, and the result, was the violent explosion of the falling cylinder, causing severe injuries to seven men, whose names are: Arch. Spore, carrier (extensive superficial bnrns, and who succumbed) ; Benjamin B. Creagh, forwarding agent and carrier, a. member of the Harbour Board, (burned about the face, hands, and arms); A. Stern, watersider (severely burned about the head, neck Jind arms), Walter Tirrell, watersider (head, arms, neck, legs and back burned), Edward Fredericks, watersider (bead, arms, neck, legs and. back burned), Henry Smith, Harbour Board employee, and Samuel Alartin (less severe bums). Several other men in the vicinity at the time of the explosion were knocked off their feet.

Only the cap of the cylinder was found after tile gas had exploded with terriffic noise and shook the buildings within a fairly wide radius to. such an extent that some thought it was an earthquake. Flames blacked the side of the s.s. Ripple,, and burned the eanvas on the bridge. A shed on the wharf was charred badly on one side. The removal of one thousand cases of .benzine from the Ripple bad only been completed a few minutes before the explosion. Tt'is the first accident of the kind that, has yet happened in Now Zealand. The late Mr Sporle was aged 24, and was married, with two young children, lie was the son of Air R'. Sporle, of Feilding, and Airs Sporle, who resides in Napier.