Santa Fe daily New Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1885-1897, 1896-02-20
ANOTHER AWFUL EXPLOSION
Tons of Dynamite Explode in a Sub
nrb of johannesburg with
Dreadful Results.
AHUNDRED PERSONS KILLED OUTRIGHT
Hundreds More Shockingly Manned
Scene of New Castle Mine Horror
Graphically observation-disclosures
Bodies Recovered.


Copyrighted 1898 by Associated Press.
Johannesburg, South African Republic
Feb. 2O.-Details are reaching this cit,
to-day of what was probably the mos
disastrous dynamite explosion on record
in any part of the world.
Thousands of people have been rem
dered homeless by the terrible calamity
One hundred persons are believed to have
been killed, 200 or 300 men, women anl
children severely wounded, and many
others more or less injured.
scRNE OF THE CALAMITY.
viedendorp, the scene of the calamity
is a suburb of Johannesburg. In it are
huddled poor whites, Malays, Kaffirs and
Cinnamon, who subsist for the most part
by doing odd jobs about the place, which
ia a railway transfer station for the min
ing district section.
Among the freight cars, standing on
the shunt mines at Viedendorp yester-
day we're eight trucks loaded with dyna-
mite hidden under canvass coverings to
protect it from the rain and the sun.
As evening was approaching, there was
an explosion near the freight depot so
awful in it's intensity that the ground for
miles around was convulsed as by an
earthquake.
Houses rocked and fell. Masses of
earth, stone, wood and human remains
were hurled skywards. The windows in
almost every house were broken and the
people blown through the air like straws
before gust of wind.
WHAT THE EXPLOSION DID.
The explosion tore hole 200 feet
long and eighty feet wide over the spot
where the eight trucks of dynamite stood.
All that quarter of Johannesburg was
literally blown to pieces.
The effects of the explosion could be
seen over radius OF more than q mile
and almost everything within half mile
of where the trucks had been shunted for
the night was razed to the ground and
crushed by the dynamite beyond redemp-
tion.
Iron work was twisted and torn, stones
destroyed and brick work pulverized.
On the ground were the blackened
shapes of human remains, limbs, heads,
trunks, scorched and torn.
The victims were mostly Malays, Kaf-
frs and Cinnamon, but a number of whites,
including six girls, are among the victims.
In fifteen minutes after the explosion
the bodies of forty dead, all horribly
mutilated, were PICKED up.
Over 200 of the most severely injured
persons were also carried away.
Already over 100000 has been raised
by popular subscription for the relief of
the sufferers.
: The New Castle Mine Horror.
Denver, Feb. 20. - A special to the
Times from New Castle, Colo, says:
Coal Mine Inspector Grifiths went into
the slope of the Vulcan mine as far as the
left entry at 10 O'Clock last evening and
found the air so poisonous as utterly to
to preclude penetration by the workmen
to the chambers where the bodies were
likely to be found. Therefore he ordered
the workmen to build brattice, tenn
pory structure composed of heavy tar
paulin and few securing timbers, to as
sist in clearing the mine of gas.
Your correspondent accompanied the
party to the scene of the construction of
the brattice. He found that the extent
ard completeness of the wreck battle
description.
HUGE TTMBERS THROWN LIKE STRAWS.
Huge timbers had been thrown like
straws from their positions and splint-
cred and scared. The tramway on the
45 per cent grade of the slope from the
knuckle to the right entry, distance
about 337 feet, was for the greater part
blown from the spikes and the steel rails
twisted like pipe stems.
Great holes were dug into the foot wall,
rendering descent into the mine most
perilous.
The danger from the incoming of un-
checked water was not SO great as at first
calculated. Instead of standing three
and four feet deep in the right entry 1t
was net deeper than six inches on the
level.
AT II O'Clock Joseph W. Fletcher, in
spector of mines for the Santa Fe road,
reached New Castle, bringing with him
;wenty three miners from Rockvale.
EN- ROUTE FROM NEW MEXICO.
Charles j. Devlin, general manager OF
he coal properties of the Santa Fe, tele-
,raphed late last night that he was on his
way from New Mexico.