Crush railway accident

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The trains, two hours before the collision
The collision
"American" type locomotive with a 2'B wheel arrangement

The Crush ( Texas ) railroad accident was an event staged for a large number of spectators on September 15, 1896, in which the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad deliberately collided two trains head-on. The result was three deaths.

preparation

The idea for the spectacle came from William George Crush, who was responsible for passenger traffic on the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad . The business idea behind it was that as many onlookers as possible would travel to the event on the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad and the railroad company would make revenue from the tickets . There was no entrance fee, and tickets cost two US dollars from all over Texas.

For the event, a tent city called Crush was temporarily built on a railway line on the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad about 5 km south of West in McLennan County . This included two fountains that were specially created, tents for the Ringling Brothers circus and a grandstand . Parallel to the existing railway line , a second was built for the event so that traffic on the main line was not disrupted.

The two used 2'B - locomotives contributed (bright green painted) the numbers 999 and 1001 (bright red). Both drove across Texas months before the event to promote it.

30,000-40,000 spectators attended the event. The crush was so great that the start was delayed by an hour until the police managed to push the people back enough to assume that no one could be harmed.

collision

At 5 p.m., the two trains were driven to the opposite ends of the 6.5 km long route. They consisted of the two locomotives and old freight cars that were loaded with railway sleepers . The locomotive drivers set the machines in motion, whereby it was precisely determined beforehand how much steam was given so that the trains would also meet in the middle of the route in front of the grandstand. As soon as that was done, the engine drivers jumped off. When the two trains met, each was traveling at around 70 km / h.

What the organizers hadn't expected: The collision led to a boiler explosion in both locomotives . Debris from the vehicles, some of which was considerable, was thrown several hundred meters away. Three spectators were fatally wounded and many injured. The official photographer of the event, Jarvis "Joe" Deane, lost an eye when a bolt hit him.

aftermath

William George Crush was immediately fired from the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad . However, since there was no negative public reaction to the event, he was discontinued the next day.

Scott Joplin , who was in the area but is not sure he saw the event, composed The Great Crush Collision March , which was released less than a month after the event. The piece of music contains playing instructions to the musicians on how the collision noise should be imitated.

See also

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Neal Suit: Anniversary of train wreck observed at Carroll. ( Memento from April 25, 2011 in the Internet Archive ). Library Baylor University, September 18, 1996.
  2. ↑ Hamilton.
  3. ↑ Hamilton.
  4. ↑ a b Bill Edwards: Rags and Pieces by Scott Joplin (1895-1905). Retrieved April 19, 2020.
  5. ↑ Vincent V. Masterson: The Katy Railroad and the Last Frontier . Columbia / London 1988, ISBN 0-8262-0668-9 ( p. 267 in Google Book Search [accessed April 19, 2020]).
  6. ↑ Vivé Griffith: Teaching Texas. ( Memento of October 18, 2012 in the Internet Archive ). University of Texas at Austin .
  7. ↑ Scott Joplin: The Great Crush Collision March. Sheet Music (Temple, TX: John R. Fuller, 1896). Retrieved April 19, 2020.
  8. ↑ Eric Ames: Scott Joplin's "Great Crush Collision March" and the Memorialization of a Marketing Spectacle. In: blogs.baylor.edu. April 19, 2012, accessed April 19, 2020 .

Coordinates: 31 ° 44 ′ 42.4 "  N , 97 ° 5 ′ 58.5"  W.