FATAL GAS EXPLOSIONS.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1017, 14 October 1882, Page 3

FATAL GAS EXPLOSIONS.

A series <>f terrible gas explosions took plaee on July 12 in the Rue du Pont Louis Phillippe and the Rue du Francois Miron, Paris, by which no less than 40 persons were killed and wounded. The following account of the disaster is given by the correspondent of the Daily News, telegraphing on July 12 ; —“ This morning, at 6, a restaurateur named Garch, whose house is at the corner of the two streets, was busy decorating the balcony with flags when his wife came to tell him she smelt gas in the cellar. He at once proceeded to warn a gas company’s agent, but the office was closed, arid the employees who should have been there had gone out to see the preparations for the fetes. Garch returned home. An hour later a detonation was heard next door in the barber’s shop. The firemen of the Rue de Sevinge were summoned and put out the fire consequent upon the explosion. When they were busy examining the gaspipes in the cellars of the two houses, news was brought that the gas on the other side of the street was burning. Underground flames darted out of a sewer’s mouth. A number of people gathered to look at them. In about 20 minutes after their first appearance, a fearful detonation took place. The house opposite Garch’s cafe was half blown down, and many other houses were violently shaken. There was an upheaval of the footpath and carriage way, and paving-stonos and splinters of iron were projected like grapeshot. When the dust of the falling house cleared away, it was seen that there were numbers of fearfully mutilated persons. The least seriously wounded ran about bleeding, and some of them bemoaned the loss of their eyes. A Fire Brigade captain was injured by the splinter of an iron pipe, and his lieutenant, Beauge, was also badly disfigured. The police and doctors of the neighborhood lost no time in obtaining stretchers, and mattresses, and in binding up the wounds. Madame Leclerq, a police commissary’s wife, was very active. While they were thus engaged the inhabitants of the street were flying with every valuable thing they could remove. They feared other explosions. Three more took place in Garch’s establishment and fire broke out with fuay on the ground and first floors. The courage of a young officer of the Guard Republicans, who by the aid of an iron crook scaled the balconies and let people down with knotted sheets, was in the highest sense heroic. There seemed every probability that he would he blown up, but he escaped. There are two policemen among these mortally wounded. I learn that several corpses have been found in the ruins of the house where the first explosion happened. Up to a late hour this evening, the whole quarter of Le Pont Louis Phillippe was thought to be in danger. It has been decided that all the money which was to have been spent there will go to relieve the victims of the ac : cident. All the windows of the side cf the Hotel de Yille nearest to the Rue Louis Phillippe were shaken by the explosion.”