DETAILS OF RAIL ACCIDENT.
FROM OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT. BRIDGETOWN (W.A.), Monday.
An alarming accident occurred to the Royal train at twenty minutes to three this afternoon. The Royal car was at the end of the train, with the Ministerial car next it, and both left the rails. After bumping over the sleepers for 200 yards, the two cars were completely turned over on their sides, falling down a low embankment and imprisoning the Prince and the other occupants. Miraculously nobody was seriously injured, though several sustained minor cuts and scratches.
The Prince was unharmed, though somewhat shaken. The accident is attributed to the rails spreading and the embankment partly collapsing owing to continued heavy rains. The Royal train was travelling from Pemberton, and the last stop before the accident was at Jannadup, where the Prince alighted, and was welcomed on the station by the local residents and children. The Prince re-entered the train, which proceeded at a moderate speed towards Bridgetown. It had just passed Wilgarup, a small roadside station, when, according to accounts given by the Prince’s staff, the severe bumping of the end of the car showed it had left the rails. Admiral Halsey was with the Prince in his Royal Highness’s private compartment when the car left the track. The Prince was writing a letter at the moment.
When the car toppled over on its side the Prince and Admiral Halsey were flung against the roof. All the windows were smashed, and both occupants were imprisoned, and remained in the car about ten minutes. Colonel Peck, D.S.O., climbed, out on the top of the car, and assisted by other helpers pulled the Prince and Admiral Halsey out through a side window. The Prince’s appearance was greeted with loud cheers. His Royal Highness called out: “I am all right.” Alighting on the track, he walked back and examined the rails, which were remarkably bent and twisted, while the embankment had also sunk considerably.
The Prince was quite cheery and self possessed when first seen in the wrecked car by his rescuers, and was still smoking a cigar. He announces he will carry out to-day’s programme to the letter.
To-day Admiral Sir Lionel Halsey gave me the following account of the accident: “The Prince was in his sleeping apartment in the Royal car when the accident happened. He was sitting on the bed talking to me. I was sitting on the arm of a chair writing a letter, when the car began to bump violently. The Prince said: ‘There is something wrong.’ I looked out of the window quickly, and saw what was happening, and I said: ‘We’re off the rails.’ Well there was nothing to be done. It was no good getting panicky; we just sat tight. Then the car heeled and fell over on its left side. The Prince was all right, for the bed was across the width of the compartment, and when the car toppled over the bedclothes all fell against the end of the bed, and the Prince fell against the bedclothes. The end of the bed was against the solid wall of the car, which proceeded to scrape along over the metals and sleepers. I was not so lucky, for I fell right across the car against the window on the other side, and also all the furniture and the chairs and table fell atop of me. The window broke, and as I struggled back I could see the metals and sleepers over which we were being dragged. This went on for about fifty yards, then the train stopped and I knew we were safe. “I do not understand how it was we were not both killed. I have had a good many narrow escapes; but I think this was the narrowest.”
A curious chain of events preceded the accident and contributed to the fortunate escape from disaster. Near a small roadside station, called Wilgarup, the driver, from the engine, saw a bullock on the road ahead. The bullock refused to leave the track, in spite of the oncoming train, and was deaf to the whistling. The driver eventually had to stop the train, descend from the engine, and chase the bullock from the track by hurling stones at it. The Royal train, at that period, had been travelling from twenty to twenty-five miles per hour. After stopping to chase the bullock the driver began slowly, and had not worked up speed, the train only travelling at twelve miles an hour when it left the rails. The Railway officials state that if it had been travelling twenty-five miles per hour when the derailment occurred the results would have been terrible.