RAILROAD SPLIT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 21 September 1943, Page 3

RAILROAD SPLIT

BY SENSATIONAL SLIP ON GISBORNE-WAIROA LINE THREE ACRES SUBSIDE (By Telegraph—Press Association.) HASTINGS, September 20. The slip which has split the Gis-borne-Wairoa railroad just this side of Waikokopu is sensational. As a single subsidence, officials of the Wellington district maintenance section of the Railways Department consider it the biggest that has ever occurred in New Zealand affecting rail communication. Three acres of hillside had slipped away toward the beach, leaving a great sunken gulf where once there had been grass-covered hillside sloping gradually down toward the railroad. The slip occurred while some railway maintenance men were clearing minor slips nearby. There was no roar or crash; just a quiet giant subsidence. There are five chains of sleepers and rails lying across the bed of the gap now; the supporting built-up railroad embankment is thirty yards further- out from its original position. The remarkable feature is that it moved there without a break in its surface. A section of the road between Nuhaka and Waikokopu which ran a short distance out from the railway, on the beach side, was shifted 50 yards.