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Hongkong Telegraph.
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- VO†ALAWF MONDAY; MAY 14, 1934.
日二月四
BINGLE COPT 10 DIGITA
EUDO PER ANNUM
DUNLOP
provides the greatest possible
TYRE
ECONOMY
WEST POINT GASWORKS EXPLOSION DISASTER Indescribable Scenes Follow Havoc-Wreaking Flash of Flame Injured Men and Women Literally Picked Up in Dozens
A view of the scene of havoc during the height of the blaze, taken by a staff photographer.
ANTENNELSEN LADY EDAD BIRTAST SEEN MAGNIFIERINTENDENRATUME
COOLIE STRUCK BY GOLF BALL.
May Lose Sight Of
An Eye
Struck by a golf ball at the Racecourse yesterday. Leung Hon, a coolie, may lose the sight of an eye. according to a report to the Police. The Injured man is the Government at
now
Civil Hospital.
NATIONAL GUARD TO BE CALLED
CRAVE SITUATION AT PORTLAND
SHIPPING LINES STOP WORK
(Special to "Telegraph")
Chu Tước graph. Ch;yriol. Tigraphie Mas
Ordinance, 1.12.20 p.m.3
enger
Receiped Moy
New York, May B.
AN OLD AND DEAD Fifty-one steamship lines
ORDER
at
Portland, Oregon, have" ahuounced that no further work on their boats; will be attempted on the Portland waterfront until ample police pro-
Mr. TugweLL AND {tection is given.
HOOVER REGIME
They have pointed out the necessity of calling out the Na- tional Guard Inasmuch as the police have found it impossible toi TURNING POINT one with the situation.--United
IN HISTORY
(Special to "Totograph") -
(Dy Telegraph. Copyright.. Telegraphic Ass
Received Ordinance,
1. LED p.m.)
In the course
May
Preas.
LONGSHOREMEN RIOTS
VIVID STORIES
BY
EYE-WITNESSES
GREAT CLOUD OF GAS SHROUDS AREA
AT THE HOSPITAL
SEVENTY VICTIMS: FIVE DIE
No fewer than 70 sufferers were admitted to the Government Civli Hospital betwden 11.30 and 11.45 a.m.. all Chinese excepting two In- dian watchmen who were on duty in the watchmen's shed near the gasometer at the time of the disas ter and who suffered severe burns, Of the number admitted, five had
number of others were so badly three o'clock this afternoon, and a burned that they are not expected
to recover.
Included amongst the admissiona
EVEN AT THIS LATE STAGE IT IS IMPOSuccumbed to their injuries by SIBLE TO GIVE AN ACCURATE ESTIMATE OF THE TOLL OF LIFE IN THE TERRIBLE DISASTER AT THE WEST POINT WORKS OF THE HONGKONG AND CHINA GAS COM- PANY THIS MORNING, WHICH RANKS AS ONE OF THE MOST CALAMITOUS IN THE HISTORY OF THE COLONY.
Appalling scenes were witnessed following the ex- plosion, marked by a great flash of flame from the Company's largest gasometer, great plates from which were hurled feet away. Over seventy badly injured persons, many of whom are not expected to live, wore treated at the Government Civil Hospital Sixty in- mates of one of the nearby terraces are said to be mis- sing, or unaccounted for, and many were killed almost instantly.
area encom-
was Mr. Lam Tung, official trans- lator at the Hongkong University, who happened to be in Clarence Terrace when the explosion oc- curred.
As soon as the first cases were
the
brought in, the whole hospital staff. from the Matron down, got to work on emergency duty, and, thanks to the splendid organisation, sufferers were soon made as com fortable as possible and their in- juries attended to.
attack the fiercely burning row of houses ЛОГОНУ the rond. Fire engines had taken stations all round the affected area and hoses uses and the terrace on the far
side of Hill Road,
For half an hour, the issue of the fight was in doubt. Falling iris mingled with the whine of
The main havoc was caused over an passed by an are running west and south from the gaso-were directed on Po Tuck Street meter. In this region, a row of houses in Clarence Terrace were swept by a blast which wrecked them com- pletely and set them blazing instantly. Two houses at the east end of Chung Fai Street, a building near the west side of the gasometer, and several houses in Chungnjured men white grimy ambu- Sing Lane were soon involved and rapidly demolished, scores of people being trapped without hope of escaping unscathed.
Immediately after the roar of the explosion, the great steel roof of the gasometer, weighing hundreds of tons, telescoped into position on top of the lower heavy steel section of the container.
Poignant scenes were witnessed: injured and half- demented, women crying with pain, searching for their children and husbands; · `men frantically seeking relatives; nearly all residents in the area in state of panic, rushing hither and thither aimlessly.
VICTIMS TERRIBLY MUTILATED ·
the fire engines and the cries of lance leers and blacked Bremen
taggered through streams filthy water and clouds of, gas; impregnated smoke,
of
The spread of the flames could not be determined at first and the water was concentrated on Clarence Terrace at the centre of
the outbreak.
HOSPITAL TAXED,
י
Firemen at work on Clarence Terrace, shown close to the framework of the gasameter, where most of the casualties occurred. (Photo: Ming Yuan).
CASUALTY LIST
Until the search for bodies in the gutted build- ings has been completed,
cannot the full toll
bo estimated, but it is stated that the following figures are approximate:
10
Dead Seriously Injured, 70 Missing
60
HALF A MILLION
·CUBIC-FEET
Stiff Wind Spreads Disaster
ENMITY INCREASES
·GRAN CHACO WAR THREATS
FURTHER FORCES FOR FRONT
(Special to "Telegraph")
10 Telegraph, Oopyright, Trivyraphia Mus agen Ordinance, £105. Fearless Moy 112.90 11.19.3
Buenos Aires, May 13. The prospects of peace be- tween Bolivia and Paraguay to-day are exactly nil.
Feeling of entity between the countries is now being worked up With a dull, muffled explosion, to a frantic pitch. In the mortuary, the bodies of the huge 600,000 cubic feet Both are massing fresh troops to two children and a man had capacity gasometer belonging to continue the hostilities on a greater already been lak, ghastly trophies the Hongkong & China Gas Com-scale, and even more ferocious fight-
of the fire. The Government pany, Limited, between H Road ing is expected. Civil Hospital and the Tung Wa and Queen's Road West, at West Paraguay is reported to be pre- ware crowded with car loads of Point, and next to their main paring to use poison gas. barned and disfigured Chinese business offices, went up in smoke Paraguay has informed Bolivia whilst many others received rough and flames, while a pall of escaped that, if Asuncion is bombed from first aid from sympathetic neighgan enveloped an area of a quarter the air (as has apparently been bours who seconded the efforts of mile square, în a blanket of yellow threatened) the Paraguayan public the St. John Antbulance Brigade fumes,
will undoubtedly lynch all Bolivian
RED HOT SHELL.
Street Tid.
LOCAL DOLLAR DECLINES
MARKET
New York, May 13.
The scenes that followed the lutely naked. The Rumes hadimen. Labour troubles are again
It was at about five minutes towar prisoners-United Press. New York, May 18.
emerging as a matter of first-explosion almost beggar descrip- burned everything from her body By noon, after an hour's con-11 o'clock this morning, and fm-
and scorched her skin. She was flct with the fre, there of a speech at class importance in the United tion.
were mediately afterwards Clarence The wind was blowing direct- screaming. It made me feel ll. signs that the outbreak was ret-Terrace with a block of some 20 Oberlin College, nt Oberlin in Ohio, States. The waterfront dispute
to Somebody threw a garment round ting under control.
three-storey houses, was in 'flames, than 20 her. to-day, Professor Tugwell, the is spreading rapidly, more dis-y from the gas works on
turbances have occurred and Clarence Terrace less
as a stiff wind from the harbour Within the office, order had Assistant Secretary of Agriculture, there is now a threat of a fresh yards away and it was on this
swapt across aud carried a verit who Professor Wirt declares to be
The roofs, and floors had vanish-ble sheet of flame, spreading dia the real head of the Brains Trust outbreak in the automobile in- row of ill-fated houses, swarming quickly been asserted.
with Chinese residents, that the
After the first shock, the tele-ed from several houses in aster in its path, and cutting of DULL CONDITIONS ON phones and fire alarms were quick-Clarence with plans for overthrowing the dustry. Constitution,
falling the escape of hundreds by the very. characterised the The strike of the lengehoremen main blow of the disaster fell.
With a duli roar, the body of ly in comunission and the sirens rafters had left the terrace little suddenness of the catastrophe. election of Mr. Franklin Roosevelt on the Pacifle Coast continues and the gasometer whalell had of a half a dozen engines advanced more than a red hot shell. ng President of the country as the frequent clashes have occurred
of the Island Immense throngs filled the turning point in the civilisation between strikers and police al-previously almost filled the super- from every part
though no really serious develop structure, fell immediately thirty towards the scene.
vicinity but a strong detnchiment of the United States.
or forty feet.
Students left. their classrooms of police had the situation well "We cannot possibly return to the ments have yet occurred,
Houses and buildings within and thronged round the entrance in hand. neighbourhood of half old and dead pre-depression order."
A mile
a bird's igates which presented He classified President Hoover
were rocked and on those nearest eye view of the scents of terror. and the preceding Republican Pre- San Francisco and other ports. to the scene, the explosion was sidents
"as archaic as the DJ
The strike has spread to New accompanid by a violent concus oxcart and the windmill."-United York.
but has beon
without alon. Presa.
violence in the metropolia,
Mr. William II. Groon, President of the American Federation of Labour, to-day uttered a warning that strikes will occur in many branches of the automobile indus try unless the strikers often satisfaction of their demande Fisher Body Company
SEASONAL DECLINE. ›
Washington, May 18.
ness nro.complicated and confused.
Six policemen and three strikers have been injured in minor riots in
Reuter.
PANIC REIGNS.
THREE TERRACES ALIGHT.
GRIM TESTIMONY.
Grim testimony of the fight
could be soen all round. Parties
YOUR CAR
INDESCRIBABLE SCENES,
Reflecting lower silver prices in London and New York, the Hong- Soon afterwards, another block kong dollar declined 1/8th thin of houses on the other side of the morning to 18, 4d. The market nullah in Hill Road, immediately locally is dull, with very little behind the mortuary, was also business passing, speculators being threatened. Flames broke out in idle.
number of places, and an in-Londen reports silver down 1/8th describablo confusion followed to 10%, while in New York allvar By this time the flames had of Chinese sat huddled together before the situation was taken in has declined to 44%, a drop of an
hand by the spread to two more terraces and in the streets clutching the few mobillaod and rushed to the spot eighth of a cent,
emergency reliefs the occupants who had until now belongings they had been able to by Scores of people dropped where been engaged with the misfor salvage.
the authorities. To take the whole scono in at they stood, overcome by terror or tunes of their follows, now dash Pale and bewildered they did ons description would fall short of concussion, whilst others, madly ed to save their own belongings. not know yet what had happened, requirements, and it was possible held, rushed for the narrow stair with a squad of police quickly and did not know whether they pressions which oye-witnesses of throwing down whatever___they The-first-fro brigade arrived Some-of-them-had-lost relatives only feably to portray the im canoe and began to pile out into followed by ambulances.
were dead or alive. In a door-the actual explosion gathered on the street, falling over each other The roadways were ruthlessly way, a young woman with burna the spot. in their rush för safety. cleared whilst ambulance men and on her face and arms was being SANITARY INSPECTOR'S STORY.
Some jumped from the lower polico, abelsied by the Intrepid attended to while sho suckled tory. Important silver inflation is verandalia and others, cooler and fireman began their attack on the her baby.
A Sanitary Inspector, Mr. H. G. unlikely as Roosevelt's gestures more self-possessed began hurling fire.
A boy from Po Tuck Street
Stevens, on la rounds, was in a toward silver are political. Fifty their possession, to the ground."
Injured men
women said: There was a big noise and bus travelling in Queen's Road Those trying to escape by the The Administration contemplates cents in the most expected.
were literally picked up by the everybody started running into Weat botwoon the Gas Works and building Currency Inflation and dollar gasometer side of the constructive changes in poitcy after
dozen and others were found the street. I followed. My the of fames
offices, and Company's Congress adjourns four or Avo devaluation are unlikely, but credit were met by blasts
brother and I used to keep a shop was about to descend the in- who were beyond all aid. which carried by the wind and. At the moment it is not known shop there but it la burnt down cling outside the Taiping Theatre, weeks' hence. The general level of inflation will continue. commodity pricos la not expected to Federal Inquiry into dairy pro-still white hot from the force of how many are dead but one ope- now and I don't know where my when he hoard Increase much, although agricul-ducts corporations will probably be the detonation, seized hold of witness saw several. "They were brother is.
ing sound followed by a dal tural prices may fluctunto spectacu- nuthorized. N.R.A. chaotle with everything inflammable and turn- quite dead and so terribly burned An elderly woman was in tenra muffled explosion, and immediately Inrly.
od confusion into chaos.
that I could not say whether they as sho described to a sympathetic afterwards a sheet of flame awept WOMAN'S EXPERIENCE.
were Chinese or not.”
crowd that she had lost a baby across his entire view, fellowad The Bremen, at great, risk to boy sho was looking aftor. "Holby falling objects which struck A bystander said: I saw a themselves, ontored the lower end ran away frightoned after the the roof of the bus. The vohtele woman rush into the street abap- of Clarence Tertage and began to (Continued on Page 7)
· (Continued on Pago 7.)
Washington influences on used slightly more than seasonal decline has started and sentiment is bad
The drought in tho wheat area has a depressing political effect as it offers a great challenge to the A.A.A. programme. Scattered rain, enough to save substantial part of the spring wheat crop, is expected this week.
service code being abandoned: SILVER OUTLOOK.
President is likely to demand a Communications Bill as an emer- Believed final sliver legislationgency measure--Per Swan, Cul- will be pormlosive and not manda-¦ bertson and Fritz.
and
*
shattor
WON'T BE OUT OF THE PICTURE
IF IT COMES FROM
GILMAN'S
Tol. 28011.
(FOR CARS ALWAYS)
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