OCR Text |
Show TNI EXPLOSION SHOWERS ROCKS HELPER, UTAH, 18 ROCKED WHEN HALF TON OF EXPLOSIVE QOE8 OFF, INJURING TWO Damage to Property From Heavy Charoe Estimated at Twcnty-Flve Thousand Dollars; Dank Building In Path of Dlast Holper, Utah. Two mon wcro sorlously sor-lously Injured and tho town of Helper literally rockod nt OHO o'clock Thursday Thurs-day morning when thq oxploslon of ono-hulf ton of TNT throw thousands of tons of largo rock fragments Into tho business section. A. U, MeNnb, a car foreman for tho Donor & IMo Orando, waH knockod unconscious by n rock grazing graz-ing tho sldo of his bond. Ho quickly rocovored nnd Is without appnront In-Jury. In-Jury. Tho explosion occurred In .connection .connec-tion with tho blasting for road construction con-struction on tho west Bido of the Prlco river opposlto Helper. Invos tlgation following tho blast led to thp conclusion that tho hoavy chargo of high oxplostvo had not boon sufficiently suffi-ciently welghtod prior to firing. Sov-eral Sov-eral structures In the buslnoss district dis-trict wero badly shattorod. Practically evory hoiio In tho community sustained somo damage from smashed windows or demolished chlmnoj-B. An outstanding foaturo or tho terrific concussion wero tho mlr. nculous oscnpos from Injury of sov oral porsons in lino of tho falling bouldors. Much porsonnl Injury wnB avoided, It ls'bollovcd, because of tho tlmo of tho blaat nnd comparative omptlness of tho stroots. School children had Just entered tholr classrooms and the business and professional men nnd women had, generally, taken up the day's routlno when tho quiet atmosphere atmos-phere was shattored hy n lltorol shower of rocks followed by tho resounding re-sounding boom of tho concusMnon. The work of demolition was accomplished inalile of thirty hoconds. Persons nt tholr work" wero shaken for n momont nnd then rosumod. Within one-half hour of tho explosion mon wero busy clearing away tho debris and commencing com-mencing tho repair of damtiges. The cut from which tho hugo slabs woro hurled Is a portion of tho do-tour do-tour being prepared for use during -construction of tho concruto highway from Prlco to Castle Gate. Tho Carbon Car-bon county rnmmtssloncrii lot tho contract con-tract for building tho detour to I'd. C Leo of Price. Immediately opposite nnd about flvo hundrod fcot from tht business section of tho town, tho contemplated con-templated detour Is to bo cut across tho rock face of Prlco canyon. It was to remove this rock ovctlinng obstruction obstruc-tion that tho blast of TNT was plncort. Tho explosion was not promuturo, It is said. Tho chargo had been plnced supposedly deep enough to ol-Imtnato ol-Imtnato flying particles and with a view to crumbling tho cllffsido. Hut when fired, tho high oxploslvo shattered shat-tered tho rock surface Into fragments, running from pobblo stio tr bouldors wolghlng sovoral tons, and threw these for several hundred feet In all directions di-rections nbovo tho buildings of the town. |