The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1915-09-30
MANY LIVES Lost
IN TUBE BUILDING
More Killed In Construction
Work Than Passengers.
EIGHT PERISH 1! IN cAvE.IN.
Record Of Subway Building In New
: York Replete With Disaster, While
For Years Millions Have Travelled In
Completed Tubes With Compare
lively Little Loss of Life.

Completed Tubes With Compare
lively Little Loss of Life.
Subway construction in New. York
has been fraught with more accidents
in which fatalities were recorded than
the actual operation Of trains in the
completed tubes, exclusive Of persons
run down by trains. Disasters were
frequent in the building Of the Inter
borough until it was opened eleven
years ago. Since that time there has
been only one accident Of importance
that of Jan. 6, in which 500 persons
CROPPED their way in the tunnel through
gases, and in which one life was lost.
This caused several hearings before
the public service commission, at which
testimony was given regarding the con-
nection between the accident at Broad
way and Fifty-third street and the
piercing Of cable by drill eleven
blocks downtown, where work for the
new Seventh Avenue subway was 60
ing on.
Two accidents marked the building
of the Interborough. The first was in
January, 1902, when six persons were
killed by an explosion at Forty first
street and Park avenue and the Grand
Union and Murray Hill hotels were
damaged. Two months later two houses
on Park avenue at Thirty fifth street
caved in.
On Dec. %, 1911, two laborers lost
their lives in a cave-in in Fourth ave-
nue., Brooklyn.
Fourteen More Killed.
Eight accidents have occurred in con-
struction work in New York within the
last three and one-half years, in which
fourteen lives We're lost. The first was
on March II, 1912, when four men
were buried in Fifty-seventh street,
west of Lexington avenue. One of these
lost his life. A small landslide occur
red in the excavation where the men
We're at work and the four fell twenty
six feet
Two weeks later Lexington avenue,
between Eighty-seventh and Eighty
eighth streets, collapsed from curb to
curb, and the street surface dropped
forty feet. This followed an extra
heavy blast, and a street car-the rails
being supported by large beams
rowly escaped the fate of the Seventh
avenue trolley which fell into the texca-
walton. - 49,. -.
The most serious accident occurred
on June ID, 1913, when ten persons
were killed by tons of earth and bowl
ders hurled upon them in a cave-in at
Lexington avenue and Fifty-sixth
street. Another explosion at One Hun
dred and Twentieth street and Lexing-
ton avenue followed a few minutes
later. :
Perishes In a Cave in.
One laborer died in a cave-in on Jan.
3, 1914, at Lexington avenue and Sixty
first street, and two others were hurt
Similar to the manner in which it was
commended that the January, 1914, ac-s
cident was caused, a drill mishap
blocked the subway last March at
Times square. Clouds Of smoke came
from the excavation, but no one was
hurt. In the same month a blast shook
the windows of Broadway stores at
Thirty-eighth street, which caused
women, thinking there had been an
explosion, to run shrieking through the
streets.
Two weeks later faulty UNDERMINING
caused the sidewalk at Broadway and
Twenty eighth street to sink four feet
The police reserves were called and
found that no one had been killed, al
though several persons were shocked
by their fall. In June a water main
break flooded the new Seventh avenue
excavation at Fortythird street
Eight persons were killed and scores
injured when an entire block caved in
recently at Seventh avenue and Tween
ty-ffth street.