New-York tribune., 1922-04-10
Fire Grew of 8
Knocked Out i'm
Trolley Crash
Flung in All Directions on
18th St. Jinx Corner When
Speeding Car Rams a
zion Hook and Ladder
Nervy Driver Averts Death
Lieutenant, Hurled 20 Feet,
Is Only One Uninjured;
Alarm Sent In by Joker

A Second Avenue car rammed Hook
and Ladder Truck 3 at Thirteenth
street last night, putting whole
platoon of tiremen on the sick list and
wrecklng the truck. Battalion Chief
Edward Quinn asserted that the
thirteenth Street corner was fire
stop and the car should have stopped
there. Fred Gibson, of 463 East t36th
Street, Bronx, the motorman, said that
ne mad orders not to stop there except
on signal. A summons was served on
him..
The injured, all of whom are suffer
ing from cuts and bruises-so some have
wrenched backs or knees-are Firemen
Joseph McCann, William Reilly, Daniel
Henncssy. Gerard Kamerer, Arthur
bahruth. Joseph Rockingham, John De-
vlne and Francis Donl,n. Lieutenant
Fritz Marshall, commander of the
platoon. was the only member Of it to
escape injury, and he was flung twenty
1eet by the collision.
Thirteenth Street It's Old Hoodoo
The hook and ladder company has its
quarters in Thirteenth Street, between
hlrd and Fourth avenues, and its hoo
doc dwells in Thirteenth Street. Au-
gust 13, 1906, it hit a Third Avenue car
at Thirteenth Street, killing Fireman
William Dayton and iniuring Lieuten-
ant Marshall May 8, 1913, there was
collision with another Third Avenue
car at the same corner. injuring two
flremen so severely that they had to re-
tire from the department.
Last nights collision would have
been the worst of the lot but for the
qulckness of McCann, the driver, and
Reilly, the tillerman. The seven-ton
truck was roaring through Thirteenth
Street, with its siren moaning and
shrleklng, on its way to Sixteenth
Street and Avenue A, where some one
had pulled box for a lark.
As the broad reach of Second Avenue
opened up to McCann's gaze he saw
the surface cor coming south from
Fourteenth Street at speed which
made a stop at Thirteenth Street i'm
possible. The man in the drivers seat
Of speedy and unwieldy hook and
ladder truck is a quick thinker. Nc
Cam gave warning yell, twisted his
wheel and bore down hard on the gas
pedal and waved his right arm in So
nal to Reilly.
Corner at Dizzy Speed
If anybody on a hook and ladder
truck thinks faster than the man in
the front seat it's the man in the rear
seat, between whose knees is the tiller
that enables the back wheels to keen
up with the tractor. Reilly had the
rear wheels swerving for the turn as
the truck leaped forward in response
to the wideopen throttle.
Seven tons Of steel. wood and
humanity careened around the corner
at dizzy speed, the iremen on the left
running board swarming up the racked
ladders to avoid the 'midships crash
which seemed inevitable.
Between them Mccain ard Reilly
made it. Instead of crashing into
the. truck broadside the surface car
took the vehicle in the rear, and at
only slight angle. It's impetus was
such, however, that the great truck
reared half its length off the pave
ment and came down again with a lar
which flung fremen in all directions.
Rubberc Dated forms Uttered the
street when doctors from the Peoples
Hospital, at 203 Second Avenue, came
running out in response to the crash
of the collision. Car and truck were
locked together. the front vestbule
and most of the glass in the former
shattered.
No One Hurt on Car
There were several passengers in the