TERRIBLE DISASER TO A PLEASURE BARGE.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2269, 20 October 1891, Page 3

TERRIBLE DISASER TO A PLEASURE BARGE.

A New York correspondent of The Times gives the following account of a shocking mishap which happened at Long Island on August 12, by which 12 lives •were lost“ A terrible accident occurred io-day on an excursion barge of Long Island. About 800 people were on board, the young folks dancing while their elders looked on. Soon after 3 o’clock in the afternoon there was a change in the weather, which in the earlier portion of the day had been bright and sunny. The sky became rapidly covered by heavyclouds, which drove before a heavy squall. The boat hands, anticipating a sharp shower of rain, let down the canvas curtains attached to the hurricane deck of the barge and fastened them down to the port side. This stopped the through draught of wind and exposed the barge to the full violence of the storm. At 3.45 a violent gust struck the barge, and almost before those on board could realise ■what was happening, the disaster had occurred. The squall lifted the starboard aide of the hurricane deck clear from its fastenings and supports, and forced the whole superstructure, posts, partition and over to port. Under

this tremendous pressure the side of the hurricane deck nearest the dock, to which the barge was fastened, collapsed and fell down upon hundreds of women and children who had crowded to that side of the barge in their effort to escape the wreckage. The air was immediately filled with the screams and agonising cries of the crushed and maimed by the falling woodwork. The officers and crew and the male passengers promptly set to work to clear the wreckage, and within fifteen minutes the fallen deck had beeu raised sufficiently to allow those who were alive and uninjured to crawl out, and to permit of the injured being assisted from the barge. The lifeless bodies of 12 persons were found near the gunwale, all having been caught between the edge of the falling deck and the guard rails and there crushed to death. Among the killed was the barge’s pilot. He was in the pilot house when the wind threw the deck over and fell between it and the dock. Altogether six women, four children, and two men lost their lives, while about 30 persons were injured, the majority seriously. The supports of the deck are said to have been in a rotten condition.