Storm
Snaps Heat Plague; 4 More Drown
Man and
Woman Struck By Lightning; Mercury Tumbles
A
violent electric storm, which paralyzed a South Camden woman,
accompanied by a driving rain tumbled the mercury last night
and ended, temporarily, the six-day heat wave.
The
storm came after four persons were added yesterday to the five
drowning victims of Saturday and Sunday. Nine persons, in all,
have lost their lives in South Jersey waters during the last
three days.
The
woman paralyzed is Mrs. Mary Bradley, 28, a temporary inmate
of the American Gospel Mission Women's and Children's
Emergency Home, at 517 South
Fifth Street. She was struck by lightning.
Edward
Saunders, 28, of 520 Jefferson
Street, station-master at the
Newton Avenue barns of Public Service, was struck by lightning
as he sat at a telephone switchboard. He was treated at Cooper
Hospital.
Telephone
poles, carrying hundreds of wires, were felled in many
sections of the city as the sharp flashes of lightning
illuminated the sky for miles.
Firemen
were called upon to extinguish several fires as the lightning
struck various objects. Many "monkey" runs were made
during the height of the storm, when false alarms were caused
by the lightning flashes.
Yesterday's
drownings made nine since noon Saturday.
Many
additional prostrations were reported as the temperature
soared to 93 at 3 p. m., within a single degree of the
all-time record for the date made 19 years ago, on June 12,
1914.
The
thunder showers beginning shortly after 9.30 p. m., toppled
the temperature 15 degrees in two hours the first actual
relief since last Wednesday.
The
weather man predicted "comfortable" temperatures for
today, with the level for the day in the low 80's.
The
only heat prostration in the city treated at the local
hospitals was that of Miss Catherine Errickson, 23, of 517 Haddon
Avenue. She collapsed while walking along Haddon
Avenue, near Carman
Street, and was taken to the Cooper
Hospital. After treatment she was taken to her home.
Lightning
struck a storeroom of the Public Service Co-ordinated
Transport Company, Mt. Ephraim Avenue and
Border
Street,
causing a small fire which was soon extinguished.
A
pole at Highland and Terrace Avenues was struck and set on
fire by lightning, many of the wires burning and dropping to
the ground. Another pole at Thirty-seventh and Parrish streets
was hit by a lightning flash.
One
of the false alarms occurred when lightning struck a utility
alarm box at the New York Ship Yard.
Mrs.
Bradley was ill at the mission home, and was being attended by
Mrs. Adeline Brewim and Mrs. Catherine Bradley, no relation,
when the bolt came in the window and struck her bed.
Police
were called and took the woman to Cooper
Hospital, where she was to have gone tomorrow for an
operation, where physicians said her condition was critical.
Mrs. Bradley was unable to talk when taken into the hospital
and her entire right side was paralyzed.
Police
notified the woman's husband, who was working in Philadelphia,
of the accident.
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