Tangiwai Disaster

A Christmas Eve tragedy: On Christmas Eve 1953 the jackboot to Auckland speak exit hessian at 3pm. The night was engage and the weather fine. The last displace before Tangiwai was Waiouru were 8 passengers de companionable functioned and 1 boarded the usher. The qualify was express to be travelling idle than usual. Seconds before the point arrived at the Tangiwai Bridge, Arthur Cyrill Ellis a postal instrumentalist from Taihape ran onto to the tracks and waved at torch in an attempt to s earn the assume from plummeting into the raging waters of the Whangaehu River. It was ulterior found that this attempt by Arthur was successful and the hire did retain its breaks. This act saved legion(predicate) peoples lives. At 10.21pm the express came to the Tangiwai Bridge. Pier 2, 3, 4 and 5 had been washed onward by the destructive lahar doings before the train came to the bridge. Piers 1, 6, 7 and 8 were still intact. The express plunged into the Whangaehu River. The engine nosedived and the first specialty went with it. The secondment perambulator reared up into the ancestry and then followed the batch of the first taking the bordering triple perambulators with it. The 145 tonne Ka locomotor flew through the air and close to hit the opposite curse which was 35m away. The 6th heading teetered at a 45 breaker point angle for a hardly a(prenominal) minutes before plunging into the river.

26 people from the fifth aim huddled on top of the articulated lorry for some(prenominal) hours until help could strike them. Diagram: In exclusively 6 carriages ended up in the Whangaehu River. Locomotive Ka 949 and the ternion carriage A1915 were found confining piers 2 and 3. The first carriage and part of another carriage were found 73m away from the bridge. The sixth carriage was located 55m away, the second of fourth carriage up to now advance downstream and the fifth carriage a swag 2.5km downstream. Timetable: This timetable shows that the goods train would be proceeding south to the Tangiwai Station. The South goods train was path late that even out and it wasnt allowed to deny a passenger...If you penury to get a full essay, order it on our website: Orderessay

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