ACCIDENTS & FATALITIES.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXV, Issue 79, 7 April 1915, Page 5

ACCIDENTS & FATALITIES.

EXPLOSIONS AT ASHBURTON. Per Press Association; Ashburton, April 6. By a strange ’ coincidence two explosions occurred in Ashburton last evening at the electric light company’s works at the north end of the town, and the other at the electric light company’s works at the south end. In the latter case an assistant engineer named R. C. Price was starting one of the large coupled engines to generate {lower for the evening light, at about 5.40 p.m., when the gas expansion chamber at the back of the engine exploded. The concussion blew up several of the iron plates surrounding the engines, wrecking the skylight, while several pipes were also wrenched loose. Price was knocked over, and later it was found that he was suffering from shocks, and that Ids right leg was badly injured. At about 8 o’clock, people living near the gasworks were startled by a loud explosion, and immediately afterwards lurid flames shot up to a height of nearly fifty feet from the engine-room at the works. Enquiries made this morning go to show that Bellard, a stoker, went into the en-gine-room to look for a nut on the floor. He bent low with a lighted match in his hand, and it is understood that a quantity of foul gas had accumulated and taken fire. The en-gine-room is a brick building with a tiled roof. The latter was blown off, and the explosion wrecked a good part of the brick work. None of the machinery was damaged, and neither the gas nor the electric light services were affected.

A SHUNTER KILLED.

Christchurch, April 6.

Alfred Henderson, a railway shunwho had his forearm and thigh fractured tin's morning whilst engaged in his work in the Limvood station yards, died at the hospital this evening. When admitted to the hospital he was semi-conscious, and he never fully regained consciousness.