The Nome Nugget

Fire and Blast Shake New York: 10 Die, 247 Hurt

NEW YORK (AP) - A furious fire and an explosion like a block-busting bomb blasted a Brooklyn pier Monday and shook the city for miles around. Ten died in the disaster and 247 suffered injuries.

Flames still flickered in the red-hot ruins of the pier the day after. Top fire officials were to launch a full-scale investigation of the $10 million blaze.

A dock worker said the fire started about 3:15 p.m. in a pile of foam rubber on the big pier, longest marine terminal in the city. Minute by minute the flames ate toward a mountain of explosive cargo—paint, lacquer, rubber cement, chemicals and fuels.

A fuse was burning toward disaster. But firemen, dockworkers, schoolboys and other spectators rushed to the scene unaware of the impending peril.

In an instant a sheet of flame shot skyward. The blast rapped off the pier shed's metal and glass roof and showered the area with a deadly hail of fragments.

The shock radiated 35 miles from the explosion. The swoosh of air shattered windows five miles away.

Chunks of white-hot steel weighing as much as 50 pounds arched over the waterfront.

The blast killed three boys in their tracks. The exciting sight of smoke and flames had lured them to the scene before the shattering explosion.

Three dock workers and three other men were also killed. One was decapitated.