Simple mistake costs life

1909 – Railway fettler John Donahee was instantly killed when he was run down by a passenger train from Cowra.

Donahee and another fettler, Mackay, were on a railway tricycle, about a quarter of a mile west of the Blayney station.

 The passenger train from Orange was due, and the men were cautioned to watch for it.

 But it was windy and raining heavily, and the men did not hear the approach of the train until it was 30 or 40 yards behind them.

 The men were not in any danger on the line they were on.  The train was on an adjacent line and would have run past them safely. But Donahee was apparently under the impression the train was on the main line.

He jumped off the tricycle and stepped right in front of the arriving train.

 Its entire length passed over him before the driver could stop, dismembering him completely.

The 40-year-old left behind a widow and family of young children.

SOURCES: Albury Banner and Wodonga Express  Friday 24 September 1909 p 32

NSW Government Railway tricycle made at Per Way Workshops, Goulburn, NSW, c.1945 2021, Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences, accessed 21 February 2021, <https://ma.as/36773&gt;