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Show Ninety Killed. Quebec, Canada, Aug, 30. Ninety men plunged to death Thursday evening when the superstructure sup-erstructure of what was to have been .the greatest cantilever bridge brid-ge in tho world collapsed and sank into the depths of the St Lawrence river between Silleriu and St; Romouuld,five miles from Quebec. All that remains of the grfind structure is its high abutments on the sides and in the river a great mass of tangled steel work that holds down the bodies of tho men that had been working on it. Tho scene is one of utter ruin. At midnight a swarm of would-be would-be rescuers lined tho shores looking look-ing for bodies, seeking to find out if some unfortunate had managed manag-ed to fight his way through the great currents that swirl about the base of tho abutments. It is believed' that only ten men escaped death. Some swam to shore, "'others, who had clung desperately to tho. superstructure when the first ominous om-inous creak was heard, were re scued by boatmen, and the re mainder of those who have lived to tell the talc had fortunately, run to- the shore end of the bridge when the metal, hitherto dumb, gave its warning. Nearly every man working on the structure was an Anferican, employed by the Phoenix Bridge Building company of Phoenix,-ville, Phoenix,-ville, Pa. There were very few Canadians on the structure. Of the ten rescued, eight are in the temporary hospital at the levies, near the scene of the' disastcr.and two are not expected to live through the night. Withoutt hought or care of impending im-pending tragedy, the men started start-ed their work today. They went to the abutment at St. Romould. All were sturdy fellows, accustomed accus-tomed to climbing, catlike, more than eighty feet above tho swish and the swirl of the river below. They walked half -way out on the superstructure, which seemed to balance itself across the water. The mechanics hailed their comrades com-rades on the other shore, about three-quarters of a mile away. Those on the Silleron side were just beginning to construct the other half of the bridge, which in about two years was expected to meet the other, and form one of the greatest feats known to engineering. en-gineering. It was only yesterday when some of the workers, white-faced, ran to shore and shouted: "The bridge is going to fall. We won't work on it anv longer." long-er." They had heard rivets creak. They had seen the stout cables sag. This morning most of the men returned. They had dried themselves them-selves of fear, after the manner of their kind. They were a'ceus-tomed a'ceus-tomed to danger, and, with" the bright sunlight and bracing air touching them, they scoffed at their fears of the night boforo. They hailed their fellow workmen work-men on the other side and soon the clang of rivet machines started start-ed up. It was about 5:30 o'clock this evening when fate decided that lives must be Swallowed up in the river eighty feet below. The grime-covered men, the the portablo forges and the gasoline gaso-line torches, knew the labors of the day were about done. They thought of the little inns where they would meet, play cards, dring their mugs of beer and forget for-get that, there was ever such a thing as hard work. When the great whistlo in the power station on the shore blew its tones signalling that high tide had set in, it was timo to quit. The men dropped their tools. They pulled down their sleeves and started for the shore. Suddenly there was a great creaking sound a noise as 'of some giant knawing at the tremendous trem-endous girdlers that web-like, were flung about the men. They halted a moment. The crunching became greater, tho bridge quivered, quiv-ered, and with cries of horror tho bidge builders dopped their burdens bur-dens and fled. It was probably half a minute before the actual crash came. Inch In-ch by inch, inevitably, the great mass of metal began to sag. Eight men reached tho abutment at St. Romould and were safe. Then -while tho wild race for life was on, while men who had faced dnnger hundreds of times without n qualm, were acting as if they were demented, the crash came. |