The New York herald., 1922-07-07
FLAMES SHOOT UP
Half Strangled Passen-
gers Risk Third Rail
and 65 Foot Climb
Up Ladders.
DUE TO SHORT CIRCUIT
Rescuers Lay Out Victims
on Sidewalks and Ad-
minister First Aid.
HEROIC ACTS RECORDED
Sitting Gases From Burning
Insulation and Fire Extin-
guishers Cause Suffering.
HEROIC ACTS RECORDED

A subway express of the Lexington
avenue line was clipping northward
yesterday at 11:17 A. NJ. the first OF
it's string Of ten steel cars flashing
past the Fifty-third street marker,
when there came from the motorbox
Of the fifth. or middle. car a sudden,
terrifying report. Instantly binding
flame. white, yellow, blue-green. shot
out Of the vestibule. noxious odor
Of burning rubber spread through the
car and train and heavy smoke added
Its oppressiveness to the confined air
of the tube.
For a few seconds the train sped
onward. then came to a stop with a
recoil that threw many persons among
the 400 aboard headlong from their
seats. All the lights went out ex-
cept the dim spots at each end of
every car, which get their power from
storage batteries. There was semi
darkness: startlement quickly sue
ceeded by terror. shouts, shrieks.
groans, prayers, the noise of breaking
glass-panic!
The voices OF men of sense and
nerve were heard entreating people to
stay where they were. that there had
been short circuiting and a blowout.
but that it was nothing serious. These
voices crying In the darkness through
fumes growing harder and harder to
endure in that close atmosphere did
little good.
Windows Crash in Scramble.
The crashing of glass continued as
men and women clawed at one an
other In their furious effort to reach
windows and break through them.
Presently string of gasping. cough
ing people. some holding hands. some
running and others walking fearfuily
because of the remembered third rail-
were making their way north and
south toward emergency exits rising
sheer as cliffs for sixty feet.
Some made the climb alone. Others
were helped by sturdier ones from be-
low. In little while rescuers. fIremen.
police and volunteers from Blooming
dale's department store came to help
out manfully and to make sure that
mono had been forgotten in the aban-
doned train through which fumes as
bad as poison gas were drifting.
There has scarcely been an occasion
OF danger in New York so weird as
this-hundreds of men and women and
Some children. too. horribly oppressed
by the terror OF their surroundings the
depth under ground. the darkness. the
vile air that was taking their breath
away and making them sick at the
stomach. the dread OF what might come
upon them unexpectedly. For ten or
fifteen minutes most of the inherited or
acquired protective assurances of
civilization fell away from these peo-
pie. and they struggled desperately to
win clean air and sunlight and the
sight of other human beings: fought
on in stark terror.
Escapes Seem n Miracle.
In the few minutes that the struggle
lasted the wonder is that dozens were
not trampled to death In the surge
from the poisonous train and in the
dim. smoke obscured tube, or that
dozens. also. did not como TO q shock
ing death from the menace of tho
third rail. The firemen and the police.
ings behave In the extremity of dam
ger and fright cannot understand how
not single person was killed or even
seriously injured by fumes or flight
But that Is the extraordinary fact.
or the 400 persons riding in a COM
pactly filled train at the beginning OF
the noon rush, less than 100 suffer--.
seriously enough from partial asphyxia-
ton TO require medical attention.
and OF these comparatively few needed
hospital care. In fact there were only
fifteen In the hospitals last night, and
none OF these was in really serious
condition.
Most OF the relief work took place on
the Lexington avenue sidewalks, where
for two blocks persons who had stag
gered out of the manholes or who had
been carried out Of these exits lay gaap4
ing for breath or relieving nausea hy
vomiting. II was curious slght--one
that looked a lot worse than II really
was. as a matter of fact.
Thousands of people. certainly not
less than $4,000. pressed upon police.
lines for near views of this strange
spectacle Of first aid Hundreds OF po-
policemen held the barriers or partci-
pated in the work OF administering
oxygen and loading the still helpless
people into ambulances that came and
went with changing bells. dozens or am
balances from most OF the hospitals
White garbed nurses. some with the Red
Cross insignia. others of Catholic sister
hoods, knelt upon the soiled sidewalks.
giving restoratives. gently welding fans.
murmuring reassurances. and black
garbed priests were scarcely less nu-
merous and practically useful
While these scenes. almost urheard OF
even In astonishing New Yorh. were