JUMP TO SAFETY

Waikato Times, Volume 119, Issue 19889, 19 May 1936, Page 7

JUMP TO SAFETY

TRAIN CREWS ESCAPE. Looomotive out of control. MAD RUSH DOWN A GRADIENT. (Special to Time-s.) TE KUITI, TuesdayThe driver and brakesman had a luoky escape yesterday evening, when one of two locomotives employed by the Ellis and Burnand Timber Company, IVlangapehi, In transporting timber logs from the bush to the mill, got out of control and with a heavy rake of timber laden trucks sped madly down a winding two-mile gradient, Jumping the traok, and piling up broadside on the final bend in a block cutting when nearing the level below. Realising themselves powerless After unsuccessfully applying the brakes, the train* crew decided to jump for safety, both making a successful landing in the bush scrubbery. Shortly after three sets of trucks broke free at the rear, taking half-a--dozen logs into the gorge below. The locomotive continued down the grade with two sets of bogies, becoming a wreck in a cutting and blocking all trafllc on the line. Over 100 men are employed at the Mangapeehi mills, and they depend on the two locomotives for transporting 40,000 feet of logs dally from tho company’s timber forest, situated 20 miles inland. A large number of men are employed at the scene of the wreck, and the manager, Mr H. Hayes, is hopeful of clearing the wreckage within a few days. The heavier locomotive, following behind, is held up, but the management anticipates that the logs on the skids will be sufficient to "keep the mills employed. But for the excellent construction and maintenance of the track the accident would surely have been more disastrous. The tramline is well sleepered and ballasted throughout and Is spanned with 561 b steel rails. It is the llrst accident for many ytars- ___