People's Pilot, Volume 2, Number 29, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 January 1893 — TERRIBLE DISASTER. [ARTICLE]

TERRIBLE DISASTER.

Workmen at Long Island City Attempt to Thaw Out a Lot of Frozen Dynamite— An Explosion Follows, and Five Persons Are Killed, Many Others Injured and a Number of Buildings Wrecked. NEW YORK, Dec. 29.—A dynamite explosion that shook Long Island City like an earthquake, killed five persons, fatally injured three and badly hurt ten others occurred at 8 a. m. Wednesday. The police figure up that there will be ten deaths from the explosion, as all of the five reported as fatally injured will die. The dead are: Henry O’Brien, of 29 Jackson avenue; Mrs. Rock, the wife of a barber on Jackson avenue; John Hopkins, John Delaney, and Barber Rock. The explosion occurred in the rear of four tenements in Jackson avenue, a street in the center of Long Island City. Just back of these houses is the entrance to the tunnel that the New York City and Long Island Tunnel company is digging under the East river between this city and the New York Central depot They use a great deal of dynamite in blasting in the work. Tuesday night the dynamite froze. The men needed some and placed three barrels of cartridges just back of the tenements to be thawed out. Then they built a fire beside them. Fire and dynamite were thereupon left alone and twenty men went down into the tunnel shaft to work. The fire burned near to the dynamite and set it off. The shock that followed was like an earthquake. The men in the tunnel shaft were not hurt. | The persons living in the tenements made up the killed and injured. The tenements from Nos. 21 to 29 were shattered, with the stores and offices below. The post office was in No. 27. The letter cases were knocked into strips and the clerks were hurled headlong into the debris. Immediately after the crash a wave of fire swept through the lower part of the tenements. It cut off all possibility of escape through the entrances to the buildings. Some of the stunned and bleeding tenants managed to crawl to the windows and make their escape in that way. The police believe that many mangled bodies will be taken from the debris. Three of the people killed were all in their homes, which were contiguous to the scene of the explosion. O’Brien, one of the killed, had his throat cut from ear to ear and his face was badly mutilated by flying glass. He was lying on a sofa when the explosion took place. A pane of glass was smashed directly over his head and a large piece acted as a guillotine. Just across the street doors were off their hinges, counters overturhfed and inmates knocked senseless. Scores of persons were injured in this way that the authorities have heard nothing about. Two blocks and a half from where the explosion took place stands a five-story brick store building and tenement. The shock tore out every window-light in the front of the top floor. Business was entirely suspended in Long Island City, and 8,000 people surropnded the ruins. When the explosion occurred all ths workmen were in the tunnel except McIntre, who was placed in charge of the dynamite at the head of the tunnel. It was at first believed he had been blown to pieces. None of the men in the tunnel were injured. It was learned later that McIntre, who was in charge of the dynamite when it exploded, was not killed. He was found at his home, where he was taken after the explosion occurred. He was placed under arrest, charged with criminal negligence. McIntre was foreman of the tunnel construction company. He was badly injured and is likely to die. To a reporter he gave a brief account of the explosion. He said he had placed about forty one-pound cartridges in a box 4 feet square, through which steam pipes run, for the purpose of thawing them out. He says he cannot account for the explosion. He remembers nothing of what happened until he recovered consciousness at his home. He says that during his thirtyfive years’ experience in such work this is the first accident of the kind that has ever occurred.