The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1899-02-03
CUT OFF BY THE SNOW
COLORADO MOUNTAIN TOWNS SHORT
OF FOOD AND FUEL.
Roads impossible Owing to Slides
way Employees Killed.

DENVER, Col, Feb. 2.-The snowstorm
that has ragged, with brief intermissions for
more than week in Colorado, was re-
newed to-day with energy undated. The
snowfall during the later hours of the night
and nearly all day was very heavy, while
strong winds piled it up and filed railroad
cuts. almost completely blocking railroad
traffic in the mountain district Snowsdes
have occurred at several points one eight
cen miles west of Leadville, Mount Ell
bert, carrying down a miners cabin and
burying William Manning, aged sixty years.
Many mountain towns are cut off from the
world, the only means Of communication
being men on snow shoes. Food and fuel
supplies are becoming alarmingly short in
many places.
difficult and really hazardous piece of
work to relieve the suspense at Brecken-
ridge, Como, Dillon and other points around
the first-named camp was successfully ac-
complished by the Colorado e. Southern
road to-day at noon, when citizens, armed
with shovels. cleared off the South Park
| tracks to the depot in Breckenridge and
much-battered supply train crawled into the
town, the first inside of three weeks The
situation at Breckenridge was becoming
critical. Food was becoming scarce; the
groceries kept in the stores were at low ebb.
1880
fed TO horses and stock. Hay yesterday
could not be purchased for love nor money.
Oats were worth their weight in gold Min
ers, prospectors, mill men and timber cut
tiers were coming in from the surrounding
hills begging provisions Breckenridge was
a spot in a sea of snow. Slides in all direc
lions made the roads leading into the camps
impossible. The supply train included sew
eral freight cars, loaded with hay, grain,
coal beef, Hour and groceries sufficient to
last about two weeks. 1t took nine hours to
make the run from Como to Breckenridge,
thirty-four miles
At Leadville the supply of coal is so
small that forced shutdown of mines and
smelters is threatened. Railroad men say
the numerous snoWslides are unprecedented
at this season of the year, slides usually oc-
curing only in the spring. The cause now
is the enormous amount of snow on the
Train No. l. on the Denver & Rio Grande,
ran into a snowslide near Shoshone about
nine miles from here The mail car tele
scoped the tender and the baggage car was
damned into the mail car. The mail clerk
and the baggagemaster were severely in
jured Their names have not been learned.
The slide which caused the disaster is about
one hundred feet long and fifteen deep.
A second snowslide occurred to-day about
six miles east of Glenwood Springs, between
there and the scene of the wreck. The re-
! lief train as well as the ditched passenger
train is now tied up til the second slide
information has been received here by
Superintendent Ridgeway, of the Denver q
Rio Grande road, that a snow slide on it's
line nine miles east of Glenwood Springs
to-day came down on top of a work train,
wrecking the engine and cars and killing
others. The Killed are: John McMahon,
Toadmaster Denver & Rio Grande, Glenwood
Springs; J. Dempsey section man, Spruce
Cliff, Col. The injured are Charles Hack
EFT, engineer; T. S. Carter, fireman; r. b.
Steele engineer; A Diver, brakeman; G.
H Berry, car repairer; B. Bernard section
Denver & Rio Grande, and were
! q In oil rirn he olx OF
the time of the slide The work train had
been sent to clear the snow-blocked tracks
east Of Glenwood ana was blowing through
drift when the slide. came and buried the
workmen For some time 1t was feared the
entire crew of thrty-two men were lost,
but all have been accounted for to Superin-
tendent Ridgeway.
A dispatch from Glenwood Springs says:
At 1890 o'clock this afternoon a gigantic
avalanche shot down the mountain side in
the canyon of the Grand river on the west
ern slope of Colorado and carried the entire
train crew and working gang, thirty-three
men in all, into the bottom of the abyss.
Special trains were sent to the spot as soon
as Intelligence reached the headquarters of
the Denver a Rio Grande road. In the
meantime more than a hundred men were
using every possible attempt to rescue their
felloW-beings who were imprisoned in the
snow. The slide was three hundred feet in
width, but thousands of tons of ice and
snow blocked the railway and made it i'm
possible for trains to pass until a road could
be shoyeled through the obstruction. The
engine caboose and f1anges were carried
down before the slide, and all the shovelers
who were scattered along the track at work
were swept before the nightly weight.
Trees, rocks and large blocks of ice which
had been formed on the side of the mountain
during the winter added to the weight of
the avalanche. Cliffs rise at the side of the
railway track 100 or 200 feet, while the side
of the mountain at the point where the ac-
cident occurred rises 2,CC0 feet almost per-
pendcularly At 8 o'clock this evening SUI
perintendent Sample received partial re-
ports which stated that five men We're dead
and a number seriously injured. There has
been no roll call to check up the crew. as
the men are all scattered. The Rio Grande
road is in worse shape now than before
Snow is piled on the track at some places
twenty feet high. 1t will take hours to
open the blockade