The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1907-08-05
CUTS OFF LEG TO FREE A MAN
NJ RECON WORKS IN 4 DO roof
SHAFT AFTER CAVEEN.

ny tne bdchaW4tn fhiirOhu ae y OOnbtruC-
lion base for boring q four track tube
through Bergen Hill in Jersey City gave
way at 2 o'clock yesterday morning. A
mass Of solid rock ninety feet high from
rit mouth to rim pitched forward and piled
up in the great hole with q roar that shook
houses for blocks around and brought
scared people flying into the streets sure
that an earthquake was shaking Jersey.
There were fifteen rockdrillers and sand
hogs cutting their way westward in a mar
row. choked tunne almost directly under
The west wall when it let go n toppled
foryard. exactly a. q ohild's house Of let
tered blocks falls. The only warning they
Lad was an instant's grinding and rending
u the huge mass OF stone. but it left them
line enough to drop their tools and rush.
lighting and clswing with each other. TO
the far end Of the incompleted TUNE and
directly away from h great cubical pit.
Thirteen OF them escaped. crawling by
ones and twos through a rabbit burrow
Of Q hole into another construction shaft
rwo blocks away. but Anton K~wiatkowski
and Pietro Tulio stopped to get their coats.
kwiatkowski is there yet crushed under
thousands of tons of rock which il will
take the engineers a day or two to pierce.
Pietro they took out yesterday afternoon
after a cool and workmaDlike surgeon had
orawled into a hole the diggers made for
him and cut his right leg on fourteen hours
after a block OF stone big az a house had
pinned il down. Pietro. the surgeon thought,
rad n chance to live with the one leg he
had left, but he was certain that il he did
rull through IL would be because OF his
rerve.
The walking bosses. big rough men
who are paid 10 do things in a hurry. sell
Tom warm to admiration over a plain
sandhog. and a Chimney at that. but any
man who's game enough to stretch out an
arm and work the hydraulic drill TO help
free himNlf after he's suffered sgonies for q
whole night, as Pietro did, has, as Big John
Dorsey put it simply, damned good stuff
in him" But death came to Pietro last
night despite his fortitude, which was I'M
shaken to the end.
The Lackawanna's new four track tubs
has been a hoodoo construction job for q
year, trouble fairly oozing out OF it. There's
been trouble about dynamiting which broke
the windows and glassware Of indignant
citizens trouble from men being hurt and
trouble most Of all from the treacherous
rap rock. which has a habit OF c~ollapsing, :
ions at a time, no matter how strongly
braced and shored. The William Grace
Company OF Chicago, which had the con-
tract to put the 1000 foot tunnel through
bergen Hill, threw up the job in disgust
months ago and the railroad has been
directing its own tunnelling since.
There are half a dozen deep shafts torn
Ivy dynamite out OF solid rock between the
railroad yards in Jersey City and the west
end. great holes which the tunnellers use
for elbow room and connecting up points.
The biggest and deepest cut is at Jefferson
VENUE and Oakland street, 100 feet long.
% feet wide and 90 feet deep, looking as il a
giant with an enormo square punch had
driven il into the solid rock and lifted out
IN enormous cube.
They had set OF a blast at 4 o'clock on
Saturday afternoon in the tunnel leading
from the west wall Of the hole. and the
fifteen Italians and Poles who we're working
there early yesterday morning were clear
.ng the loose rock and dirt from the choked
burrow. Probably it was the surface
water constantly working downward in
the seams which finally cut away a mass
Of stone as big as an apartment house and
let it drop lazily forward. The rift was
as clean as an axe cut in soft wood. When
the wall fell the roaring and grinding was
heard for miles around. and people living
near the shaft heard also the screams Of
Pietro Tulio.
Fred Kemp and John Dorsey, walking
bosses on the job, and r. Lewis Whestley.
the railroad ~company's assistant engineer.
swung down into the hole on the crane
hoist within half an hour. but 10 was a long
Job before they got near enough to Pietro
10 find out whether he was alive or dead.
thirty men worked steadily. chipping,
drilling, tearing at the rock with their
bare hands and burrowing like SO many
moles before they cleared AVA the mouth
If the tunnel and got a glimpse Of the
Italian.
Pirtro lay 10 q recess or niche. two great
blocks of stone meeting just over his head
and protecting him from the downrush
Of smaller rocks. When they had made a
hole to Pietro large enough for John Dor
say TO worm his way through. Dorsey tried
10 pull Pietro free. and then he found that
the mans right Ies was hsld fast by a big
wedge Of rock. IL tool hours more to en-
largo the tunnel and give IN men working
SPACE. and meanwhile they fed Pietro on
milk and crackers. He wanted whiekcy.
hut they didn't dare give him that because
hey were afraid it would weaken HE heart
n the end.
How do you feel. Petrol they asked
hm about 10 O'Clock In the morning.
Mocha bad" said Pietro. Il mska
date with my Giuseppina. I wanna keepa
ia date"
As fast az they Clipped the rock away
rom Pietro they stuffed soft cotton waste
INTO The holes TO ease the lay OF his body:
but try az they would. they couldn't loose
the grip OF the big rock that pinned his right
leg down. Pietro was losing strength fast.
Uut when they finally got small hydraulic
drll into the hole and tried to cut away the
rock with 1t. Pistro had sand enough to
adjust the drill with his arms and suggest
where the best place to cut would be.
Along about ? o'clock in the afternoon
he aSkad for n nriczt poliCo Comnfa-