The Hyde railway disaster occurred on 4 June 1943 near the small settlement of Hyde, Otago, New Zealand, on a bend of the

Otago Central Railway The Otago Central Railway (OCR) or in later years Otago Central Branch Railway, now often referred to as the Taieri Gorge Railway, was a secondary railway line in Central Otago, in the South Island of New Zealand. Construction Construction o ...

. At the time, it was New Zealand's worst railway accident; of the 113 passengers on board, 21 were killed and a further 47 were injured. However, just over 10 years later, the

Tangiwai disaster The Tangiwai disaster occurred at 10:21 p.m. on 24 December 1953 when a railway bridge over the Whangaehu River collapsed beneath an express passenger train at Tangiwai, North Island, New Zealand. The locomotive and the first six carriage ...

took 151 lives on 24 December 1953. The Hyde disaster remains as the second-worst railway accident in New Zealand's history.

Background

The Hyde disaster involved the daily passenger express train from

Cromwell Oliver Cromwell (25 April 15993 September 1658) was an English politician and military officer who is widely regarded as one of the most important statesmen in English history. He came to prominence during the 1639 to 1651 Wars of the Three Ki ...

Dunedin Dunedin ( ; mi, Ōtepoti) is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand (after Christchurch), and the principal city of the Otago region. Its name comes from , the Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. Th ...

. In 1936, a year-round daily passenger express train was introduced, replacing a thrice weekly express that had been augmented by slow

mixed train A mixed train or mixed consist is a train that contains both passenger and freight cars or wagons. Although common in the early days of railways, by the 20th century they were largely confined to branch lines with little traffic. Typically, service ...

s. This service left Cromwell at 9 am and reached Dunedin at 5:20 pm; in 1937, the schedule was accelerated by half an hour and it was this timetable that was in force on 4 June 1943. The train was hauled by a steam locomotive, A^B 782, and consisted of seven passenger carriages, a guard's van and two wagons of time-sensitive freight.J. A. Dangerfield and G. W. Emerson, ''Over the Garden Wall: Story of the Otago Central Railway'', third edition (Dunedin: Otago Railway and Locomotive Society, 1995), 42–3. 4 June was a Friday and was to be followed by the King's Birthday long weekend, which boosted patronage to 113 as many passengers travelled to the Winter Show in Dunedin or horse races in

Wingatui Wingatui is a small settlement almost 15 kilometres west of Dunedin, and two kilometres east of Mosgiel. It has become a suburb of Mosgiel, but continues to maintain its own unique identity and heritage. Known primarily for the historic Wingatu ...

.Geoff Conly and Graham Stewart, ''New Zealand Tragedies on the Track: Tangiwai and Other Railway Accidents'', revised edition (Wellington: Grantham House, 1991

986 Year 986 ( CMLXXXVI) was a common year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Byzantine Empire * August 17 – Battle of the Gates of Trajan: Emperor Basil II leads a Byz ...

, 103. Prior to the accident, some passengers became concerned about their safety. Regular commuters were aware that the train was travelling at excessive speedEmily Toxward, "Service Recalls Hyde Disaster", ''Otago Daily Times'' (5 June 1993). and one who had moved from his seat to stand with friends in another carriage was forced to return to his seat as the movement of the train made it uncomfortable to stand.Mike Crean, "Premonition of Doom", ''Star Sunday'' (16 December 1990), Section 3: 1. In the minutes immediately preceding the accident, luggage and parcels fell from racks above the seats.

Accident

The disaster occurred at 1:45 pm when the express failed to negotiate a 183 meter radius curve in a deep

cutting Cutting is the separation or opening of a physical object, into two or more portions, through the application of an acutely directed force. Implements commonly used for wikt:cut, cutting are the knife and saw, or in medicine and science the scal ...

known locally as Straw Cutting, shortly after crossing the Six Mile Creek between Hyde and the

Rock and Pillar Range The Rock and Pillar Range of high hills is located in the Maniototo, an area of inland Otago, New Zealand. They are surrounded by the Taieri River, which has its source in the range, flowing out across the scroll plain at Paerau, before almost d ...

. The train derailed, with the locomotive coming to rest against the side of the cutting 60 meters from where it derailed; the

boiler A boiler is a closed vessel in which fluid (generally water) is heated. The fluid does not necessarily boil. The heated or vaporized fluid exits the boiler for use in various processes or heating applications, including water heating, centr ...

burst, extinguishing the fire in the

firebox Firebox may refer to: *Firebox (steam engine), the area where the fuel is burned in a steam engine *Firebox (architecture), the part of a fireplace where fuel is combusted *Firebox Records Firebox Records was a Finnish record label based in S ...

but severely scalding the

fireman A firefighter is a first responder and rescuer extensively trained in firefighting, primarily to extinguish hazardous fires that threaten life, property, and the environment as well as to rescue people and in some cases or jurisdictions also ...

. The carriages piled up around the locomotive; all seven passenger carriages had left the tracks, with the second overturning and coming to rest in front of the locomotive while four of the other carriages telescoped together. The guards van and two goods wagons at the rear failed to derail.Dangerfield and Emerson, ''Over the Garden Wall'', 43. The force of the crash was such that the undercarriage of one was twisted into the form of a letter "S" and one passenger who survived was thrown out of their carriage, struck the side of the cutting, and bounced back in through another window. Bits of the train were scattered throughout the surrounding farmland and the cutting contained a mass of splintered wood, bent steel, and broken seats; an attending doctor described it as resembling "the result of a bomb blast".Adrian Webb, "Doctor Recalls Horrific Scene", ''Star Sunday'' (16 December 1990), Section 3: 2. Due to the remote location, it took approximately 90 minutes for rescuers to arrive. Reports reached

Middlemarch ''Middlemarch, A Study of Provincial Life'' is a novel by the English author Mary Anne Evans, who wrote as George Eliot. It first appeared in eight installments (volumes) in 1871 and 1872. Set in Middlemarch, a fictional English Midland town, ...

of an accident where there "were possibly a few injuries" and medical personnel did not initially travel in a hurry to the disaster, but upon catching sight of the disaster from a rise in the road half a mile away, they proceeded swiftly. In the intervening time, the injured were tended by the passengers from the relatively undamaged rear carriagesConly and Stewart, ''New Zealand Tragedies on the Track'', 104. and by local farmer Pat Kinney, who owned the property through which the cutting ran; Kinney's son Frank had boarded the train at its last stop in Hyde and was one of the deceased.Mike Crean, "Tragedy for District, Hell for Driver", ''Star Sunday'' (16 December 1990), Section 3: 2. Some passengers were trapped in the wreckage for several hours and medical personnel – with the assistance of railway maintenance staff – worked until it was too dark to see.

Casualties

Those killed were:

Aftermath

The isolation of the disaster site was compounded by wartime conditions and little news was published of the accident. Relatives of the victims did not receive news of their loss until the next day.Mike Crean, "Waiting for the Worst", ''Star Sunday'' (16 December 1990), Section 3: 2. A

board of inquiry A tribunal of inquiry is an official review of events or actions ordered by a government body. In many common law countries, such as the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia and Canada, such a public inquiry differs from a royal commission in that ...

was established to investigate the accident. Based on the state of the wreckage, it found that the train had to be travelling in excess of on a curve with a speed limit of and had thus derailed due to the operation of

centrifugal force In Newtonian mechanics, the centrifugal force is an inertial force (also called a "fictitious" or "pseudo" force) that appears to act on all objects when viewed in a rotating frame of reference. It is directed away from an axis which is parall ...

. It found that the judgement of the driver, 55-year-old John Corcoran, was markedly impaired as he had been drunk, and thus charged him with serious dereliction of duty. Corcoran was tried in the Dunedin Supreme Court with manslaughter, found guilty, and sentenced to three years' jail. The train's guard was reprimanded for not taking action when he became aware of the train's excessive speed, but he was not criminally prosecuted. In the years after the disaster, it had little legacy as it was overshadowed by World War II. When a memorial was established to victims of the

decades later, relatives of Hyde disaster victims began to work for their own memorial, led by Molly Winter and Elizabeth Coleman. In August 1990, a committee was formed to erect a monument, a 2.5 m high cairn, at an easily accessible site near the location of the derailment.Mike Crean, "Memorial to Forgotten Rail Crash Victims", ''Star Sunday'' (16 December 1990), Section 3: 1. The cutting of the disaster itself can also be walked, as the Otago Central Railway closed on 30 April 1990 and has been converted into the

Otago Central Rail Trail The Otago Central Rail Trail is a 150-kilometre walking, cycling and horse riding track in the South Island of New Zealand. A pioneering project for New Zealand, the successful rail trail joined the New Zealand Cycle Trail umbrella organisation ...

. The disaster was the only significant accident involving passengers that occurred on the Otago Central Railway between the start of construction in 1877 and closure.Dangerfield and Emerson, ''Over the Garden Wall'', 44.

References

External links

Christchurch library Hyde disaster pageTe Ara article with photoMason, Greg. ''An Accident in Waiting''
casting doubt on the official findings {{coord, -45.3517, 170.2376, region:NZ-OTA_type:event, display=title History of Otago Derailments in New Zealand Railway accidents in 1943 1943 in New Zealand June 1943 events 1943 disasters in New Zealand