The sky lit up with repeated explosions. A fireman on a goods train at Euroa 45 km away saw the glare of these repeated explosions.
People hurried to Hume Hwy, about 6 km from Benalla on the Melbourne side.
When they arrived, they found a six-tonne army truck had been demolished by an explosion.
It was burning fiercely; Private William Jones and driver Trevor White, the two soldiers in the cabin, had been killed instantly.
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Nearby trees were sheered off by the explosion and were burning.
The truck had been carrying cordite charge canisters for 150 mm artillery from Somerton in Melbourne to Albury. Two hundred of them had exploded.
Internal wrapping from canisters and other pieces of the canisters were found up trees and spread up to 70 m from the truck.
Police investigations revealed that the driver may have fallen asleep. Tyre marks on the road indicated that the truck gradually veered off the straight, flat road, then ploughed through roadside trees before coming to a stop. The impact resulted in its engine catching fire.
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These trucks had petrol engines, so fire was not unexpected. Police at the inquest also stated they believed the truck had been travelling much faster than 50 km/h.
Jones’ father gave evidence that his son had told him the truck’s steering was defective. It pulled to the right. He stated that his son told him that he had ‘burst’ a brake drum the previous day.
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Major Rupert Upson assured Alfred Grubb, Benalla’s Acting Coroner, that cordite charges would not explode unless detonated.
The Acting Coroner declined to say how the accident had occurred. He recorded an open finding on May 27, 1947.
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On 15 June 1947, the army attempted to overturn the coroner’s finding by ministerial statement.
The Minister for the Army announced that any report of an explosion was wrong, because cordite does not explode.
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However, a massive explosion had been heard by all of Benalla.
Cordite is a low explosive that normally deflagrates or burns in a controllable subsonic combustion, just like black powder.
However, like black powder, cordite will explode, especially if confined and set aflame.
There are ample examples of this. For example, accidental cordite explosions blew apart three British battle cruisers during the Battle of Jutland in 1916 with the loss of 3181 sailors.
- John Barry, Coo-ee
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