Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 40, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 October 1907 — EXPLOSION KILLS FORTY [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

EXPLOSION KILLS FORTY

Du Pont Powder Mills Near Fontanet, Ind., Are Wrecked TOWN IS WIPED OUT. More than Six Hundred Hurt and Scores of Others'May Die. DESTRUCTION IS WIDESPREAD. r Mysterious Blasts Ruin Village and Spread Death and Injury. Forty or more persons dead, almost as many fatally burned or hurt, 600 others injured more or less seriously, and a prosperous town leveled to~the earth —such was the harvest of a series of terrifying explosions nt the Du Pont blasting powder mills near Fontanet, Ind., Tuesday morning. After the explosions, which followed one another with frightful effect, came Are, and what the one horror left undone the other completed. Thus, manypeople who rnight_Jhave been dragged from the ruins and revived were the victims of the flames. How many bodies hay.e been incinerated is a mat

ter of guesswork. but twelve hours after the catastrophe the fatalities were believed to be below fifty. The worst explosion came when 40,000. kegs of powder blew up. Governor Hanly and a detachment of the Indiana National Guard at once took control of the death camp. Soldiers paced up and down the wreckcrammed streets. In and about the smoking ruins of the great powder plant privates in the ranks in detachments endeavored to discover the remains of unknown victims. Scores of

women and children whose husbands and fathers were missing were In the background, anxiously awaiting word from the relief corps: Town la Hopeless Raia. Tuesday morning Fontanet was a prosperous, cozy little town of 1,000 persons. That night It was a hopeless ruin. Every building, Including homes.

stores, offices and factories, was shaken Into pieces. A hand of Infinite power sweeping all before it with demoniac; wrath could not have worked greater havoc. ■ - y " The dead and more seriously hurt have been removed to other points—most of them to Tere Haute, eighteen miles distant. At least 500 inhabitants of Fontanet remain, however. Nearly all of them hear bloody traces of the Visitation. They are camping out in tents hurried there by the Governor, and must be fed and eared for during many months to come. The town is devastated. Yet Its people, so far as • possible, seem determined to remain and make the best.of their misfortune. The cxploslonsatthepowder mills came without warning. What caused the first one Is a mystery and may never be explained. Once the combustion had started tWere was no stopping It and one by one seven mills were shot into the air in splinters. Two hundred men were employed at the works, but luckily only seventy-five were at their labors when the first explosion took place. Big Mill Is Shattered. —The—blg—press—mill- was destroyed first. This was at 9:15 o’clock. The shock and detonation were indescribable. The ground shook for miles around "—it is reported that the effect was felt at a distance of 200 miles—buildings rocked as If riding a seismic swell - . And then within two minutes the glazing,nilll was ruined. The building burst outward and upward, shooting timber, metal and glass in all directions anakimne many. Next, the two coining mills and finally, as an unspeakable climax, the magazine and cap mill were torn to bits. I'he magazine was situated about 300 vrirds from the main buildings of the »)ant and did not ignite for over an - bour. Then the flames which were licking up the debris had so heated the

atiuosphere that the magazine responded. There were 40,000 kegs of blasting powder stored in the magazine and every one blew up seemingly at the same moment. It'was this detonation that shodk jo pieces the homes and stores and factories in Fontanet and which brought death or Injury to scores miles distant. Shock la Felt Far Off. Throughout the surrounding country, in farmhouses and country schools, where women and children sat, build-

Ings crashed to the ground. Persons out in the open, walking In the road far from the powder plant, were burled off their feet and injured. A passenger train on the Big Four Railroad, nearly five miles from the magazine, was all but blown off the rails. Every window in each coach was broken and a number of passengers were cut by flying glass.

ALL THAT REMAINED OF THE PONT POWDER MILLS, AT FONTANET, IND., AFTER THE EXPLOSION.

HOMELESS FONTANET PEOPLE OUTSIDE OF THEIR RUINED HOMES.