Sheradan, PA Gas Explosion, May 1902

TWENTY-ONE DEAD AND 300 INJURED.

Fifty More Deaths Expected as Result of Catastrophe Near Pittsburg.

BIG GAS EXPLOSION FEARED.

Huge Main May Have Been Damaged by Concussion of Last Night's Detonation.

SPECTATORS CAUGHT BY FLAMES
They Had Assembled on the Hillsides to Watch Burning of Cars.

Pittsburg, Pa., May 13. -- Twenty-one persons are dead and not less than three hundred others injured as the result of the terrible catastrophe at Sheraden last evening. Of the three hundred injured the physicians say that at least fifty will die.
At 9:30 o'clock this morning nine bodies were at the Pittsburg morgue and five at the Carnegie morgue. The last body was brought in at 5 o'clock this morning A list of the dead follows:
JAMES KEENAN, aged 20, single, Carnegie, clerk on wreck train, died at Mercy Hospital.
CHARLES HEARTIG, aged 18 (or 13), Chestnut Mines, Pa., died at Mercy Hospital.
W. W. TAYLOR, aged 27, brakeman, Miller's Station, O., died at Mercy Hospital.
HARRY F. SMITHLEY, aged 20, Urichsville, O., level man on Panhandle Railroad, single, died at Mercy Hospital.
________ FINNERTY, Sisterville, W. Va., aged 40, died at Mercy Hospital.
G. E. HUNTER, aged 28, married, five children, freight conductor, Sheraden, killed at wreck, body taken to McDermott's undertaking rooms, Carnegie.
WALTER E. WRIGHT, aged 26, Sheraden, killed at wreck, taken to McDermott's undertaking rooms.
DALLAS M. BYRD, fireman, aged 28, Sheraden, killed at wreck, taken to McDermott's undertaking rooms, Carnegie.
PASCAL MADER, aged 28, section foreman, badly burned, died at Allegheny General Hospital.
Unknown Boy, badly burned, taken to Allegheny General Hospital, died in short time.
DONALD SMITH, aged 10, Sheraden, son of JEROME SMITH, train dispatcher, badly burned, died at Allegheny General Hospital.
GEORGE WILSON, aged 15, messenger, of Sheraden, body partly cooked, died at 2:30 o'clock this morning at the Homeopathic Hospital.
MATTHEW MARNON, teamster, aged 24, single, 25 Chartiers avenue, McKee's Rocks, body fairly cooked, died at Homeopathic Hospital at 4:30 this morning.
JOHN SWAN, brakeman, aged 30 years.
ALBERT McKEAN, aged 22, brakeman.
HUGH FINHERTY, 65 years.
TONEY LEA, laborer, 20.
_______ LEWIS, burned to death on the track.
Unknown Boy, found in potato field on farm of J. R. DOUGLASS, burned to crisp and unrecognizable.
Unknown Woman, burned to death on hill overlooking scene of explosion.
LAWRENCE KEENAN, clerk, Carnegie.
Many of the dead have not been reported to the coroner, and an accurate list cannot be obtained at this time.

Big Explosion of Natural Gas Is Feared.
The officials of the Pan Handle Road fear a worse explosion than the three which wrought so much damage yesterday. A danger line has been established 500 yards on all sides of the burning wreckage and the railroad police are keeping the curious crowd back.
A few feet below the burning wreckage lies the big 36-inch main of the Philadelphia Company, which comes from the gas fields in the southwestern portion of the state and which supplies the McKee's Rocks and lower Allegheny districts with natural gas.
It is feared that the concussion was so great yesterday that some of the joints or even the pipe itself might have been damaged, and if such is the case the gas, which is under great pressure, will soon force its way through and another terrific explosion would follow.

Twenty Cars Still Burning.
About twenty cars are piled up between the Sheraden station and Cork's Run, in the Sheraden yards. This is still a mass of flames. It covers an area of 40 by 150 feet. In there are all kinds of merchandise.
The volunteer fire department of Sheraden and No. 10 Engine Company from the West End are playing streams on the burning debris, but little headway is being made owing to the fact that the entire wreckage is saturated with naphtha and kerosene, and every now and then a fresh volume of flame shoots out from various portions of the smouldering ruins.

Story of the Accident.
The accident happened in the railroad yards at Sheraden, where the Panhandle Railroad makes a turn near Cork's Run. Banked in by two high hills, hundreds of people were caught. At this point, which is about one-fourth of a mile from the city line, there are thirty-three tracks. Upon these tracks there were several hundred cars.

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