EFFECTS OF A TORNADO ON A RAILWAY.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1128, 31 July 1883, Page 3

EFFECTS OF A TORNADO ON A RAILWAY.

The force of the tornadoes that have recently being devastating parts of the United States is illustrated by an account supplied by Mr R. Perkins, of the Cairo Short Line General Freight Department, with head-quarters at St. Louis. He visited the region struck by the tornado that swept through the Missisaipi in the vicinity of Brookhaven on 22nd April, directly after the wind had spent its force, on a locomotive sent by the Illinois Central Railroad, and was astonished at what he saw. In travelling over the track of the tornado he saw a freight car that had been lifted bodily from the ravine and carried almost directly skyward thirty feet on to an elevation. In this car three negroes were playing cards at the time it was struck, in addition to a white man and his wife, who had fled to it for refuge. All but the white man were instantly killed, and he was blown, with a fragment of the car, among the limbs of a large tree, sustaining bruises in his flight that caused his death shortly afterwards, When the explorer began to look after the property of the railroad company he found that the station building had been blown away, together with its contents, tickets, iron-benches and all. There was no station-house there at all, and nothing to indicate where its ruins were likely to be found. Ho discovered a woman lying near the ruins of a house, who had evidently attempted to escape. She was in a dying condition, but from her friends he learned that a baby had been torn from her arms, and that its body could not be found in any place in the neighbourhood. The telegraph operator of the place sought refuge in an hotel, but was blown away with it, gnd was so badly injured that it was

thought he would certainly die. Mr Perkins, although not in the tornado, was near enough in its track to hear the noise and see the cloud, which was intensely black. The sky looked like a lake of molten lead. A piano was blown 500 yards from a house. Mr Perkins says that he never saw such a sight before, and never cared to look upon such a spectacle again. On Sunday, May 12, a terrible cyclone or tornado passed over Kansas City, Missouri, United States, killing four persons, injuring fifty, destroying or injuring 145 houses, and causing a loss of some 300,000 dollars (£60,000), Trees as thick as a man’s body were snapped off and whirled about like straws, and roofs and heavy timbers were carried across two or three streets. A carriage containing a lady and gentleman was carried with the horse attached to it about 30 feet. The track of disaster was about 150 feet wide, and travelled from west to east, and it is marvellous that only four persons were fatally injured. Substantial brick residences were demolished, while fragile wooden structures beside them would escape. In the main track of the storm nothing escaped except young trees that could bend to the earth before it. A lady, once a resident in Patea, was negotiating for the purpose of a house, which happily had not been concluded, when it was demolished in a moment. A house at which she was visiting, the residence of her brothers, received a gentle touch from the zephyr, and lost its roof, and sustained damage to the tune of 2000 dollars (£400). One of the happiest escapes was at the German Chapel where 100 children had been dismissed at four o’clock, all of would probably have been killed half an hour later, as the heavy briak building was torn to pieces as if 100 tons of dynamite had exploded there.