8 APRIL 1957

In office blocks and in stores in the central business district of Cape Town, clerks and general assistants, supervisors and managers and members of the general public were aware of the clock ticking down for the close of business. Most were packing the last few things away to make their way to the station to be on time for the 4:34 departure to Bellville.

About half an hour earlier, the same scenario was playing out in Bellville. Employees were going through the daily weekday ritual of preparing for the trip home. They were aiming to step onto the 4:14 to Cape Town for the journey that took about half an hour.

It was a Monday and as Mondays go, it was a fairly normal day – dealing with clients, customers and colleagues of a multiplicity of dispositions, as human nature dictates. There are always the sullen ones still dealing with the start of a new week – Friday seeming so far in the future, the cheerful and friendly variety and the cantankerous, obnoxious folk who elevate abrasiveness to an art form. It takes all types to make an interesting world.

At home wives, husbands and children were preparing for the arrival of loved-ones about to embark on the homeward journey. Food was being prepared. For the most part kids were returning home from an afternoon of fun – playing with their buddies and some healthy socialising. Most were looking forward to an evening listening to late afternoon radio serials or huddling around early evening radio programming in this period before the arrival of television in South Africa (still some twenty years in the future).

Harold, in his office in an Adderley Street business complex, was raring to make his way to the station. Mondays are best put behind one and the next weekend being eagerly anticipated. The telephone on his desk rings. It’s a toss-up – should he answer it or not? It continues to ring – incessantly. A hesitant hand reaches out to lift the earpiece from its cradle. At the other end a familiar voice. The most difficult client. Neither is happy. The client is demanding. Harold wishes her away. A five minute exchange. Harold signals his irritation – also in the way he returns the earpiece to its cradle.

Hurriedly Harold gathers his papers and picks up his lunchbox to scurry along to the station. Annoyingly, the elevator seemingly takes a lifetime to fetch him and lazily disgorge Harold on the ground floor. Determinedly he makes his way at a brisk pace and heads towards the platform, arriving at the very moment the 4:34 steadily picks up speed and leaves the platform and a frustrated Harold behind – cussing under his breath.

In Bellville, Ian was also a trifle late for his 4:14 train to Cape Town. He, though, managed to board in the nick of time with mere seconds to spare. Normally he would alight at Salt River station, dart across the pedestrian bridge to the next platform and meet the southern line making its way to Simon’s Town. He would, however, end his journey in Wynberg. From the Wynberg station it was a short five minute trundle to his home and wife and kids anticipating his arrival. This Monday, however, he had some last minute personal business to attend to in Cape Town, so remained in his seat for the additional short commute to the city.

Two men. Different circumstances. One missed the train, the other just made it and remained on board longer than he normally would have. The randomness of life – stark! Inexplicable. 

The collision took place near Woodstock, a few hundred meters from the old Esplanade station. Hurtling at a rate of knots, these two commuter trains were on a fatal trajectory to their doom. Human error – be it related to signals, misreading signals or simply misplaced tracks – the result was inevitable once the mistake had been made. Had Ian alighted at Salt River, he would not have been on board mere moments later when, before the next station, Woodstock, a tangled mess littered the tracks after an overwhelmingly explosive impact. Had Harold not answered the call from an irate client, he would have been on board and shared Ian’s fate – together with the seventeen others who failed to survive the collision on that fateful day. The force of the impact was so severe that eighteen were killed instantly, eighty others suffering devastating injuries and the rest milling about the shattered wreckage and twisted tracks in a shocked daze. Of the eighteen killed on impact, many were dismembered. Commuters who miraculously made it out alive reported the horror as the gravest they had witnessed – scenes that would haunt them for the rest of their days. Decapitation, limbs flung in opposite directions to the rest of the torso and bodies momentarily airborne. Those injured would live with disability for the rest of their lives. 

Harold would attribute his escape to his guardian angels. Ian was the meekest, most kindly man with deep faith – where were his angels? Relatives of the eighteen dead and also the eighty injured themselves would have been able to proffer some reason why they either lived or died on that fateful Monday. Those who missed the train were certain of a higher hand protecting them. Folk who had randomly boarded the train for the first time in their lives would wonder why they had found themselves either as victims or witnesses to the horror. 

Where lies the truth? Wherein lies the explanation? 

The randomness of these events is inexplicable. Could one legitimately conclude that destinies are determined by unpredictability, lack of any predetermined pattern or planning. Why do good things sometimes happen to bad people and bad things smite good folk? Are the dice loaded one way or another for each of us?

That fateful day, 8th April 1957, is cloaked in yet another of life’s mysteries.  

©Paul M Haupt

Photographer unknown