The Savannah morning news., 1902-01-11
TORPEDO DID NOT EXPLODE.
District Attorney jerome Inspects
New York TunneI in which Ter
rible CatastrOphe occurred

New York. Jan. 10.-Dstrict Attor-
ney Jerome, State Railroad Commits
sioner Baker, Assistant District At
torney Caravan and Supt. Franklin of
the railroad, to-day made a trip of
inspection through the tunnel in which
the recent disaster occurred. The
party left the Grand Central Station
on a locomotive with no car attached.
A thorough examination of the tunnel
was made, including the workings OF
the block signal system. Tests were
made also of the distance at which
lights could be seen through smoke
ana steam in the tunnel. The signals
III all their workings between Fifty
ninth street and Fifty-sixth street.
where the accident occurred, were gone
over and closely examined and tested
AT the end of the district attorneys
"trip through the tunnel one of those
VINO had accompanied him said they
had found the atmosphere fairly clear
most of the way, but at Ninety-siXth
street they were enYeloped in a cloud
of smoke and steam so dense that
nothing could be seen. On the return
trip the tunnel was clear At Sixty
third street the green light showed
plainly, that being the cautionary sig
nal before entering the block below,
ana the observation engine slowed up
until the red danger light was seen
at Fifty-ninth street. The bell rang,
but the torpedo did not explode. The
engine was stopped and train officials
explained that the little mogul, or OBJ
serVation engine, was not heavy
heaVy enough, nor its wheels large
enough to explode the torpedo as a
big passenger locomotive would do.
According to the Evening Post the
torpedo went into position alongside
the rail automatically the moment the
read light was shown by the block sys-
TEN and should have been cut and eX-
ploded by the fange on the wheels of
the engine. After a consultation it was
decided to bring up a heavier switch
engine of the same size as the pas
senger engines. The engine came up,
the little observation engine was run
out of the way and the larger engine
was brought through the block Again
the tropedo failed to explode Four
more times the big locomotive was run
through the block and not once did the
torpedo explode. The railroad officials
explained this by saying that the me-
chanism throwing the torpedo into
place had been pressed out of order SO
that the flange of the wheels did not
touch the torpedo.
After the inspection of the tunnel
District Attorney Jerome announced
that he would not oppose an acDlica-
ton for the release of Engineer Wisker
of $4,000 bail. This action, he said
was the result of the investigation
which showed the authorities that d
charge of murder in the first degree
could not be made against the engin-
eer. The charge that could be made,
he explained, was manslaughter in the
second degree.
VIII Change to Electricity.
The Herald tomorrow will say:
The New York Central Railroad will
change it's motive power in the Park
avenue tunnel within a year. Electric
ity will be substituted for steam on
all local trains, and as soon as posi-
BILE trunk line trains will be hauled into
and out of the Grand Central Station
by less dangerous methods.
An extra force of experts has been
added to the large force of electricians,
and these have been at work within
the tunnel since Wednesdays accident
trying to devise satisfactory plans for
a speedy change.