Arizona silver belt., 1889-01-12
HARMLESS ACCIDENTS
WHICH ARE NOTABLY INTERESTING
 TO RAILROAD PATRONS.

haps Never Before Reported-Lost Driv-
 ing Wheels-Wrecked Locomotive-A
 swItchman's Mistake.
 Curious accidents happen on railroads. Because they are not attended with loss of life the public never hears of them, and yet they are so strange that most people will be inclined to believe they never happened or could happen.
 Some time last summer one of these hap pened on the Rock Island road within loo miles of Chicago. A passenger train was running at full speed across a rather level piece of country. The train was probably making sixty miles an hour when, without ! any premonition whatever, all four of the | driving wheels suddenly left the engine and went spinning of across the fences into the adjoining fields. Why they did it nobody knows to the present day; but they did it, and the strangest part of it all is that nobody was hurt, and but little damage was done to the road or tho train. Of course the train was brought to @ rather sudden standstill l Being left without its main support, the en- zine dropped down until the firebox scraped along on tho ties ard rails for a short dis tance, but it was so well held up by the pilot wheels, and the strong couplings of the ] tender that it did no serious damage, and not a wheel except those that went spinning off across the fields, like so many school boys hoops, left the tracks. Of course the train was delayed until word could be sent to the nearest station and another engine secured, but that was tho only inconvenience that anybody suffered from this very strange happening.
 WRECKED LOCOMOTIVE.
 Something over a year ago a passenger | train on the Northwestern road was pulling up toward 0 station ill northern Wisconsin town. The baggageman and one of the other trainmen were standing in the door of the baggage car looking out, as such men often do, at a village as they pass drought. Just before they reached the station they were surprised to see alongside of the track a wrecked locomotive. It had been going in the same direction they were going, and they saw ct once the wreck had been very recent It was not, however, until they pulled up at the station that they discovered the engine was the one that had been pulling their own train It seems it had exploded, jumped the track and fallen in the ditch complete wreck, without disturbing tho remainder of the train, and it all happened 50 silently that, while they were only the second car from the engine, they had not heard the explosion or the crash it made when it left the track.
 A very strange accident occurred on the Chesapeake and Ohio road. Tho train was running down grade at Q rapid rate of speed in the West Virginia coal district, when it plunged into mass of soft earth and rocks uhat had fallen down tho mountain side on to the track. The concussiol, while not so abrupt, was sufficient to throw tho locomo- tive from the rails, and it rolled over into the river. The rebound cnapped tho pin con- meeting the tender and the baggage car, and tie former shot forward, jumped clear over tho debris, landed safely on the rails, and was found ct the foot of tho grade, three miles hoTa the wrecked engine. Tho automatic brakes held the remainder of tho train, not wheel of which left tho track. Another engine was autographed for, and the train went into Louisville on time. Mono of the passengers was any the wiser for their mirac- 1ious escape. The engineer and fireman went town with the engine, and both swan ashore. Earring little shaking up and cold bath, aAey were none the worse for their nights 1.,ven9ure, and proceeded westward with the ..a;n.
 President Strong, of the Atchison, Topeka ;ld Santa Fe railroad, had close call once o1 the Atlantic and Pacific railroad. Ho 7yas cn route to San Francisco and was trav- ing in q private car. A small single span ac; bridge had burned out during the night, -aving the rails suspended. They were
 nioned at either end by the ordinary bolts
 u splice bars. and the heat had warped
 n until they resembled the phonetic
 :n.bc5 in shape. The train was running
 c1e neighbcrhood of mile minute when
 s5-uc!, the warped rails, and heaven only
 -o7ys what held it up, but they passed over
 right, with only slight damage to the
 2. Probably the terrific rate of speed at
 .ch the train wes flying saved tho lives of
 ol board.
 TWO NARROW ESCAPES.
 Two very narrow escapes from smash up we recently happened to the limited trains
 ming east from Chicago, and both oc-
 rl'ed not very long ago. The first happened
 .hin the first 100 miles out from this city
 tho train going east. IL was to meet