Los Angeles herald., 1909-02-13
THREE KILLED,
SEVERAL HURT
IN BIG STORM
LANDSLIDE BATTERS DOWN
HOUSE AT RUB!O CANYON
WIFE AND TWO cHJL.
0REN BURIED IN RUINS
Unidentified Body Washed Ashore at
Santa Monica and Boy Drowned
in Arroyo de Los
Pesos


Rainfall for season .................. 1903
Rainfall last season to date. 1O5l
Husband, wife and two children buried In
landslide at Rubio canyon. One boy is dead
woman may die but husband and other son
will recover.
Body of unidentified man is found on the
shore at Santa Monica beach,
Mexican boy, Is years old, falls into Los
Pesos arroyo and is drowned.
Walls Of brick building at Fifty fifth street
and MOneta avenue collapse
Houses, streets and lands flooded and
street and steam railroad traffic seriously
impeded.
hISLODGED by a deluge Of rain
which descended yesterday aft
ernoOn in the vicinity of Rubio
canyon, tons of earth and rock swept
down from the proclivitous sides of
the adjacent mountain, carrying away
the Pacific Electric pavilion situated
at the entrance to the mouth of the
canyon and sending the building, to-
gether with four members of the fam
lily which occupied it, into the stream
of water fifty feet below. The house
was torn and twisted and reduced to
ruins and buried under the earth and
rock.
Dead:
THAYER DREW, years old; body
found in ruins.
Injured:
Fred Drew, 46 years old, station
keeper; two ribs fractured.
Mrs. Fred Drew, SO years old; bruised
and cut; condition serious; may die.
George Drew, 8 years old; cut on
head and body; will recover.
Mr.. and Mrs. Drew and four children
n hUi16inp WI yTyifb
| warning the avalanche of earth de-
scended. Mrs. Drew and the children
| were in the living portion of 'the house
when she heard the rumbling noise of
the approaching landslide and imme-
diately seizing her twin daughters,
Dorothy and Helen, 9 years old, aDd
pushing them out to the platform of
the building, told them to run as fast
as possible to the incline, as their lives
were in danger. The children ran as
directed, and when they arrived at
place of safety and looked back they
saw the house had fallen into the
gulch.
Shortly after the landslide at the
mouth of the canyon there was another
avalanche about half mile up in the
/ same canyon near the falls. The ava
lanche was heard for a great distance,
and carried with it about one-half the
quantity of dirt and rock borne down
in the first slide.
The avalanche moved with great
rapidity down the side of the noun
tain, a distance of about five hundred
yards, choking up the bottom of the
canyon at this point until it was almost
impossible.
No damage was done, and reports
that party of reScuers was caught in
this second slide are unfounded. There
was no house or camp in the path Of
the second avalanche.
1t is said the mother could have es-
capped all injuries had she not gone
into the rear of the building to rescue
her son, Thayer, who was killed.
Early this morning it was learned
that Mrs. Drew, who also suffers con-
siderably from shock, was returning to
consciousness. She had been insensi-
bic to all about her, moaning and Sob
| bing incoherently, and 1t could not be
told whether her skull had been frac-
tured because of the swollen condition
of her head
Mr.. Drew is seriously injured, but
his injuries are confined, it is believed,
to the fractured ribs, it having been
decided by the doctors that his spine,
which at first had been believed to
have been fractured, Is not injured
The boy George will recover.
Fears of Pneumonia Held
Unless pneumonia develops, which
the doctors fear because Of the long
exposure of the victims to the cold
and rain all the patients will recover.
Last night by the light of lanterns
a party worked desperately in the
ruins of the pavilion and the heaps of
rock to find the body of Thayer Drew.
At 11:30 o'clock rescuerS found the
body and it was taken to the morgue
at Pasadena.
The twin girls, who were uninjured,
are being cared for by superintendent
Turner Of the mountain division Of the
Pacific Electric railroad.
Ernest Carker a workman of the
Pacific Electric company in Los An
geles, was the hero of the catastrophe.
Standing on the platform outside tho
pavilion, he heard the roar of the slid
ing rock which hurled the structure to
the canyon below and ran directly to
the only point where he would be safe
Carker lives at 1149 East Firty-
sixth street, Los Angeles. He was sent
to Rubto canyon yesterday by the
Los Angeles office to inspect the trails
and see if the recent storms had
washed them out
He had finished his inspection, re-
turned to the pavilion and was resting
after his luncheon when the landslide
came, following a cloudburst Of un-
usual fury. Mr.. Carker gives the fol-
lowing account of the accident:
about noon we had an awful cloud
burst which filled the canyon bed with
water. 1 stepped outside the pavilion,
where we were alf staying, and thought
1 would watch the water.
Hears big Crash
Suddenly heard a crash behind the
pavilion and ran around the corner to
see what the trouble was. Before I
got to the back of the building, but
after I had cleared the corner an enor-
nous mass of rock struck the back Of
the pavilion and knocked 1t right down
into the bed of the canyon. I only es-
capped because 1 got clear from the
house by running around to see what
was the trouble.
"The heavy rain had loosened the
earth on the side OF the mountain back
of the pavilion. AS the pavilion is Just
built on little shelf it had no solid
support, and the whole structure easilv
was torn from its hold on the bench.
First I found the boy George partly
buried under loose dirt. 1 pulled him
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