FLOODS IN MEXICO.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 178, 1 September 1909, Page 2

FLOODS IN MEXICO.

1200 DEAD AND 15,000 HOMELESS. GREAT BUILDINGS DESTROYED. PATHETIC SCENES. By Cable.—Press Association.—Copyright London, August 30. Renter reports that there ure 1200 dead and 15,000 homeless at Mocitcry. The damage is estimated at four millions sterling. Over seventeen inches of rain fell on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Tiie greatest losses were experienced on Saturday, when great buildings be gun to crumble and fall. Many roofi were crowded with hundreds of people most of whom subsequently disappeared Ninety women and children took re fuge at a scboolhouse, but the risinj water drove than from floor to floor While two priests were blessing then the walls' collapsed and all were drown ed. 1400 PERISH IN ONE TOWN. A FAMINE FEARED. MANY BUILDINGS COLLAPSING. DAM AND RESERVOIR BURST. THE CHIEF CAUSE OF THE

FATALITIES. A DEATH-TRAP TOWN. Received August 31, f1.45 p.m. Mexico, August 31. Fourteen hundred perished at Monterey. One fourth of the city was destroyed. The water mains are useless; consequently there is no driving waicr available. A famine is feared. Thousands refuged in the cathedral, churches and schools. Many buildings, soaked with water, continue to collnpse, slowly adding to the death roll. ' The collapse of a reservoir and dam Is the chief cause of the fatalities at Monterey, which lice in the centre of a cup-like valley with steep mountains on three sides. The water rushed, spelling the current of the river. Subscriptions arc pouWng in from all parts of Mexico.