TRAGEDY IN FINLAND

Wairarapa Times-Age, 7 October 1938, Page 6

TRAGEDY IN FINLAND

EXPRESS AND GOODS TRAIN COLLIDE IN FOG THIRTEEN KILLED & TWELVE INJURED. MANY OF THE VICTIMS OVERCOME BY GAS. By Telegraph—Press Association. Copyright. (Received This Day, 12.50 p.m.) HELSINKI, October 6. Thirteen were killed and twelve injured when an express and a goods train collided in a fog, between Ruaha and Tainonkoski, resulting in the explosion of a sulphur dioxide tank asphyxiating a majority of the victims. The accident occurred because some of the wagons were unusually long and thus the goods train was shunted on to the main track. The driver, hearing the approach of the express, leapt for his life as the express crashed into the wagons, telescoping two sleeping cars and killing the first victim. Gas overcame men and women climbing out of sleeping cars. They fell back into the splintered coaches and died. People rendering first aid. being without gasmasks, were unable to approach until the fumes dispersed. Meanwhile they watched five persons succumb. The debris is expected to yield up further corpses. The goods train driver and another employee have been arrested.