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The Train That Fled Into the Fire: The Metz Disaster of 1908
Season 7
Episode 15
Published 3 months ago
Description
On Oct. 15, 1908, a freight train pulled away from Metz, Michigan, carrying families trying to escape one of the worst forest fires in state history.
The passengers believed the railroad would carry them to safety. Instead, the train entered a burning corridor lined with cedar posts, railroad ties, hemlock bark and timber. Heat had damaged the tracks, and the locomotive derailed near Nowicki’s Siding. The open freight cars behind it became a deadly trap.
In this episode of The End of the Road in Michigan, we revisit the Metz Fire of 1908, the doomed relief train and the families caught between flames on both sides of the track. The story includes the desperate evacuation, the survivors who crawled through smoke and burning ground, and the residents who stayed behind and lived.
The fire killed 37 people across Presque Isle County, destroyed much of Metz and left hundreds without homes as winter approached. It also exposed the dangers created by logging waste, drought and the lack of organized emergency planning in early 20th-century Michigan.
This is the story of a village built by the railroad—and the night that railroad carried its people into the fire.
The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications
This episode includes AI-generated content.
The passengers believed the railroad would carry them to safety. Instead, the train entered a burning corridor lined with cedar posts, railroad ties, hemlock bark and timber. Heat had damaged the tracks, and the locomotive derailed near Nowicki’s Siding. The open freight cars behind it became a deadly trap.
In this episode of The End of the Road in Michigan, we revisit the Metz Fire of 1908, the doomed relief train and the families caught between flames on both sides of the track. The story includes the desperate evacuation, the survivors who crawled through smoke and burning ground, and the residents who stayed behind and lived.
The fire killed 37 people across Presque Isle County, destroyed much of Metz and left hundreds without homes as winter approached. It also exposed the dangers created by logging waste, drought and the lack of organized emergency planning in early 20th-century Michigan.
This is the story of a village built by the railroad—and the night that railroad carried its people into the fire.
The End of the Road in Michigan is a production of Thumbwind Publications
This episode includes AI-generated content.