The San Francisco Examiner from San Francisco, California • 2

Page 2 S.F. EXAMINER Jan. 18, 1979 Smoke almost igot to rescuer i I.J iiA rL By James Si hermcrhorn Thomas Harkness sat up in his hospital bed and ran a hand his hair, still full of black smoke particles. But he was alive, land well, and glad to be out of the tunnel, although "I wasn't too sure there for a while." I Harkness, a 32-year-old BART troubleshooter, was the first to reach the crippled commute train beneath the Bay last night and lead rescuers to the 40 choking passengers. Last night he was on duty in the BART transportation room near the Civic Center when he got a call Saying that "we've got an emergency in the tube." Harkness jumped on the first train going east and listened to the radio conversation on the way.

He learned there was a fire and 40 people to be brought out. They had been ordered into the lead car of the westbound train. When his train stopped where the other train was thought to be stranded, he climbed out of the cab window into the gallery between the two tunnels. Using his keys to open one door after another, he walked up the gallery, until he saw the end car. He opened another door and "I ft BiilliPlilSililllBIP just saw a black cloud." Then seven Oakland firemen arrived on foot from the Oakland side.

"I told them to turn left and find the lead car and bring the people out. I'd hold the door." Harkness said, he didn't know how many minutes passed as the firemen led one gagging, choking person after another up to fhe door, where he helped them through the gallery to the other tunnel, where the train that Harkness had ridden into the tunnel was waiting for the victims. Some of the rescued passengers were stumbling. "One woman pretty much collapsed. I picked her up and carried her across," said Harkness.

The firemen were wearing breathing apparatus, but Harkness didn't have any. As the train took off, said Harkness. "it caused a vacuum and sucked all that smoke into the gallery. There was a whole wall of smoke coming right at me, 40 or 50 miles an hour, it looked like. And no place to go." Although the seven firemen had oxygen tanks, they were being depleted.

Harkness, and a BART policeman who was also there, had nothing. "I didn't want to breathe but my body said breathe," Hark- Log of events during the fire in BART tube Here is a chronology of yesterday's BART accident as compiled from logs of the rapid ta transit district and the Oakland Fire Department: i p.m. Train 117 at mile-post 4.8 in trans-Bay tube reported smoke and fire on train. Fire Department dispatched to San Francisco line. (BART Central Dispatch Supervisor's log notes all times between 6:04 and 6:57 on his log are approximate.) 6:09 First alarm received by Oakland Fire Department 6:18 On arrival there, firefighters advised fire was in trans-Bay Tube and box alarm for special BART emergencies transmitted.

6:18 Ten firefighters boarded train at Oakland West to go to fire scene. 6:20 Passenger train 111 released from Embarcadero Station to scene to pick up passengers from Train 117. 651 Train 900 enroute from Oakland West with Fire Department on board. 633 Oakland Fire Department calls for an additional pumper truck (engine company) and an additional chief. 6:48 Oakland Fire Department calls up two more engine companies and one ladder truck.

6:57 All passengers evacuated from Train 117 and on board Train 111 enroute to Oakland. Personnel on board Train 900 leaving train on foot toward Oakland entrance to tube. Fans unable to keep up with smoke. Train 377 enroute from Oakland side to rescue tired firemen. 7 p.m.

Emergency truck 998 set on track and enroute to area. Unit 995 also placed on track and enroute to scene. Train from San Francisco side dispatched with firemen and emergency crewmen. 7:10 Special call for more Oakland help, bringing a total of 50 Oakland firefighters to the scene. Midnight Train 117 still on fire in trans-Bay tube.

Train service being provided between Richmond-Fremont, Concord-MacArthur and Daly City-Montgomery. 7 a.m. Last Oakland fire fighters return to their station. Enaminerv Walt Lynott BART TROUBLESHOOTER TOM HARKNESS FEELS 'PRETTY GOOD' He helped lead 40 choking commuters to rescue train beneath the Bay ness. "I didnt have any choice." and a little farther on a train clear through his clothes, blacken- coming in, carrying more firemen, ing his arms and legs, face and The nine men started walking toward San Francisco, some two Harkness and the others finally and a half miles distant Along the emerged near the Ferry Building.

He was taken to San Francisco way, he said, they met some San His eyes burned and his chest General Hospital, where he said Francisco firemen coming on foot, burned. The smoke had seeped today he felt "pretty good." Dead Oakland fireman, 'the idolized John Wayne "We would follow him into any fire, onto any roof. He was an ax-swinging leader, our guide really." Kenton's eyes clouded over when he recalled the dinner Elliott cooked yesterday. "There was this one Okie guy with us who kept saying he didn't know what Cordon Bleu was. We were all laughing and having a good time." Elliott joined the fire department Sept.

1, 1951, and was promoted to lieutenant May 1, 1965. He had served in Truck Co. No. 1 for the last 12 years. His daughters are Laurie, 26; Alana, 24, and Martine, 16.

His son, William, is 16. Maura Dolan the firefighters to reach Elliott. "When I first felt for a pulse, there wasn't one," Kenton said. "But we dragged him out and began administering oxygen to him. We finally got a pulse and he started throwing up.

We were all praying he was goinq to make it." Kenton said John Wayne was Elliott's "idol." Elliott saw every John Wayne movie made, and in many ways, the two men were alike, Kenton said. "Bill was a big, strapping robust man who liked everybody and seemed incorruptible. He was a leader, someone you could depend on. But he died at 8:46 p.m. yesterday at Providence Hospital in Oakland, of toxic gas and smoke Inhalation.

Elliott, 52, a Castro Valley resident, leaves his wife, Geraldine, three daughters, a son and two grandchildren. He was among a second group of nine firefighters who went into the BART tubes from the East Bay end at 6:45 p.m. Fire officials said he was trapped in a thick, poisonous cloud of black smoke created when a train carrying passengers pulled away, blowing smoke behind it. Engineer Tom Kenton, also of Truck Co. 1, was among the first of Lt.

William Elliott of the Oakland Fire Department was known to his buddies in Truck Co. No. 1 as "The Duke the John Wayne of the department." He was a superb chef ho had cooked a Cordon Bleu dinner for 11 co-workers just hours before he was found unconscious in an area between the two BART tubes shortly after 7 p.m. yesterday. At a department Christmas party last month, he looked a little sad when he told co-workers he would not be around for the next Christmas party.

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List of the injured Here are those injured in the BART tunnel fire. At San Francisco General Hospital: (All considered in stable condition and receiving oxygen toi smoke inhalation) Thomas Harkness. 32, BART technician. Clitf Shirley. 43.

BART policeman. John Connley, 28, Oakland fireman. Robert Coombs. 48, Oakland fireman. Walter Habeltch, 38, Oakland fireman.

Robert Hewitt, 39, Oakland fireman. Jack Johns. 33, Oakland fireman. Don Olson, 42, Oakland lireman. Warren Davis.

58. Oakland fireman At Providence Hospital, Oakland: (All but one person tn satisfactory condition, suffering smok inhalation) Christopher Heath, Oakland fireman, senous condition. Morris Frank, passenger. Paul Gravelle, BART employee. Robert McGue, Oakland battalion fire chief.

Lauren Dewey, Oakland fireman. Dennis Holmes, Oakland fireman Joe Levitch. Acme Ambulance driver. Doug Jay. Acme Ambulance attendant Cindy McCommon, Acme Ambulance attendant At Merrltt Hospital.

Oakland: (All in stable condition, most suffering from smoke inhalBtion) Roberta Crawford, a passenger, 460 Leland San Francisco. John Dean, passenger, 1218 43rd San Francisco. Eleno Padilla, BART employee, 1013 Harding Fairfield. Bob Varni, BART employee, 2962 Cortina Drive. San Jose.

Tom Corporandy, Oakland fireman, 566 Hastings Drive, Benicia. Wayne Schutte, Oakland fireman. 4326 Heyer Castro Valley Richard Cecil, Oakland fireman, 1893 Natalie Court, Castro Valley. Mike Triplet, Oakland fireman, 3344 Flrr Alameda. Gary Gerner, Oakland fireman, 3142 Pine Valley Road, San Ramon.

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Include charee fir rxxtage outside I niu-d parcel Zone. Add $1 haiKiiinp charge lor orders under Mo. Ot'it-r empires in days. 'Mr I EXCLUSIVE PHOTOS Sixteen rolls of exposed film a record of life at the Peoples Temple compound in Guyana were removed from the bullet-shattered body of Examiner photographer Greg Robinson, slain by the Rev. Jim Jones' gunmen.

The Examiner has recovered the film and, Monday (through Friday), will provide the photographic record of "The Faces of Jonestown." Starting Monday MME SAN I RANC1SCO: STOCKTON AT OTARRtXLMOUNTAIN VitW: SAN ANTONIO CtNTEROAKLAND: DOWNTOWN CONCORD-PARK SHOPHAYWARD: SOUTHLAND DUBL1VSACR AM ENTO: SUNRISE. SOUTHGATE, COUNTRY CLUB ut LVK cti rrvTru nri lj rm i xDtt: ti i rDunr rtuni Bnn.T79.iii'.? jr i 9 I.