TRAINS COLLIDE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 8 December 1943, Page 2

TRAINS COLLIDE

MUCH DAMAGE DONE FIVE MEMBERS OF CREWS INJURED. ACCIDENT ON MAIN TRUNK LINE. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) AUCKLAND, December 7. Rolling-stock was piled up in wild confusion and much damage was done when two goods trains collided headon in a cutting on the main trunk line two miles north of Taumarunui shortly after noon today. Five members of the train crews were injured in various degrees, though not seriously, and were admitted to the Taumarunui Hospital. Owing to the difficulty of clearing the wreckage the traffic on the section is not likely to be restored before about 2 p.in. tomorrow. In the meantime all express trains arc being diverted by the Stratford line, involving delays of about two hours at their destination.

The south-bound goods train had left Frankton at 4.30 a.m. for Taumarunui and the other had left Taumarunui at 11.59 a.m. The collision took place at a point near the Ongarue River and overlooked by the main highway. The engines met Avith a heavy crash and came to rest one on top of the other, while the tender of the south-bound engine was stood on end. Many trucks of both trains were telescoped and reduced to wreckage. Several damaged trucks in the southbound train contained pigs, some of which escaped injured into the scrub, where they were subsequently rounded up and shot, while others were either killed outright or entangled in the wreckage. Their squealing made pandemonium, till it was possible to extricate or kill them.