CAR SOMERSAULTS INTO STREAM

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22516, 26 September 1938, Page 12

CAR SOMERSAULTS INTO STREAM

TWO MEN DROWNED THREE OTHERS INJURED (TBB3S AMOCIATIOB tlLlOim.l AUCKLAND, September 25. Two men were, drowned and three others were injured when a motor-car struck the concrete buttress of a culvert on the main road from Morrinsville to Tahuna, and somersaulted into a stream about 4 a.m. to-day. The car was irreparably smashed.

The victims Killed

George Trevor Pahl, a lorry-driver, aged 29, married, of Tahuna. Jack Meta, a Maori, a lorry-driver, single, of Walton. Injured Athol Pahl, a lorry-driver, aged 24, married, of Morrinsville, who suffered cuts and abrasions and a possible fracture of the left foot. Condition not serious.

Waki Kiri, a Maori labourer, of Tahuna, who suffered cuts, abrasions and shock. Discharged from hospital after attention.

William Walton, a lorry-driver, aged 19, single, of Tahuna, who suffered cuts, abrasions, and shock. Discharged from hospital after attention. The car, a large sedan model, owned by Mrs J. Napp, of Walton, struck the buttress right at the end with the centre of the radiator. The impact completely wrecked the front portion of the car, and forced the engine back into the body. Thjß end of the concrete buttress was shattered. After hitting the buttress the car somersaulted 10ft into the stream below, coming to rest upside down in about one foot of water. The occupants were pinned inside, G. Pahl and Meta being trapped with their faces under water. Walton, who was the least injured, was the first to escape, and he went to neighbouring farmhouses for assistance. Constable McMullan, of Morrinsville, was summoned, and he arrived shortly after 4 o'clock, when he found G. Pahl and Meta dead inside the car. Timber jacks had to be used to raise the car sufficiently to recover the bodies. The party of men had attended a dance at Tahuna Hall, and later they went to Hamilton. They left again about 2.30 a.m., and were on their way to Tahuna when the accident happened only a mile from G. Pahl's home. DELAYED EXPLOSION OF GELIGNITE DEATH OF TWO MEN (press association telegram.) NEW PLYMOUTH, September 25. One man was killed and another died from injuries in the explosion of gelignite, which was being used to fell part of a tree on the property of Mr L. Vickers, at Midhirst, on Saturday afternoon. The victims were:— " Donald Victor Lindsay, single, aged 24, killed instantly. George Edward Blazey, married, aged 62, died in hospital. An attempt was being made to dismember a standing tree. One charge was placed to blow oft a limb. Five or six plugs of gelignite were used, but the charge did not explode. While Blazey and Lindsay were placing a second charge an explosion occurred. Blazey was taken to the Stratford Hospital, where he died this morning. HEAD-ON COLLISION TWO OCCUPANTS OF CAR INJURED (PRESS ASSOCIATION TELEGRAM.) AUCKLAND, September 25. T\vo persons received extensive injuries when their motor-car was involved in a head-on collision on the Great South road, near Pokeno late last night. . They were:—

Eila Brighouse, aged 15, of Waiuku, who suffered concussion and an injury to her jaw. Alfred McAllister, aged 30, a married man, of the Public Works Department, Pokeno, who suffered a fracture of the spine and head injuries.

Both were pinned under the car> which capsized after the impact, and were extricated only with difficulty. The driver, H. Biddle, of Maramarua, escaped unhurt, and was able to crawl out from the upturned vehicle. Miss Brighouse was lifted out by passing motorists, but the car had to be raised before McAllister was released.

The car in which the party was travelling was going towards Pokeno when it became involved in a collision with a car travelling in the opposite direction. The driver of the second car and its five passengers escaped unhurt. Both the front wheels of Biddle's car were torn off by the force of the impact. The car turned several somersaults before coming io rest upsidedown at the side of the road. The sedan top was stove in, and wreckage was strewn across the road. The vehicle was completely wrecked. The other car was extensively damaged, the off-side front wheel being broken.

RAILWAY SURFACEMAN KILLED STRUCK BY TRAIN (FXKSS ASSOCIATION TELXOKAU.) 'Struck Dy an early train from Hawera to Wanganui this morning, James Wilbury Massey Mclntyre, a railway surfaceman, was killed instantly. The accident occurred about 300 yards from a level crossing at the intersection of High and Gladstone streets, on a section of track that is perfectly straight. How he came to be struck is not explained. Mclntyre left the Hawera station for his work shortly before the departure of the 7.25 train. About 400 yards south of the crossing he removed the jigger he was riding on from the track and was about 60 yards from this point when struck. He was a single man and had been in the employ of the department for two years.

SMALL BOY INJURED James Middleton, aged nine, of 24 Lichfield street, was admitted to "the Christchurch Hospital at 9.20 a.m. on Saturday, suffering from head injuries and abrasions. The injuries were received by the boy when he stepped of? the footpath to cross the road at the hospital corner, and was knocked down by a cyclist.

AGED MAORI KILLED

FALL FROM TRAIN INTO RIVER (FKESS ASSOCIATION TZLBGBAW.I PALMERSTON N., September 25. Ramairihi Tititi. a Maori woman, aged 93, of Tahoraiti, near Dannevirke, was killed in tragic circumstances on Saturday. She was a passenger on the Wellington to Napier express, and was returning to Dannevirke from a short stay at the Ratana pa. As the train was passing over a bridge which spans the Pohangina river at Ashhurst, by some means she fell from a carriage platform and was thrown into the shallow water 25 feet below. Death wag instantaneous. Both her legs were broken. BODY IN STREAM POLICE SEEK INFORMATION (press association tkligbam.) WELLINGTON, September 25. In the bed of a small stream near the Cross Creek railway station, a small settlement of railway workers who operate the Rimutaka incline on the Wairarapa side of the mountains, there was discovered "'at 4 p.m. on Saturday the body of a man who may have been dead for two months. It has not yet been identified.

It is estimated that the man was aged between 50 and 60 years. He wa» stt 9in in height, grey haired, but going bald. He was of medium build, with round features, and had false upper teeth, and three or four lower teeth missing. The clothes on the corpse were a navy blue suit, a white and blue striped shirt, two cotton singlets, woollen underpants; black woollen socks, black boots, half-soled with round rubber heels, and rolled gold sleeve links. The police are seeking information.

WOMAN FATALLY INJURED

(press association telegram.)

DUNEDIN, September 25,

When the car in which she was riding got out of control near Beaumont on Saturday afternoon and capsized, Mrs Mary Yates, aged 59, who lived at 132 Helensborough street, Wakari, suffered severe shock from which she died about an hour and a half later. Mrs Yates was travelling with her brother, Mr J. C. Nicholls, ot Milton, vrtiQ was .driving, and was on her way to Heriot when the accident occurred at Craigalachie.

MOTOR-CYCLIST DIES OF INJURIES

AUCKLAND, September 25,

Struck by the Frankton-Rotorua mail train at the Broadway railway crossing, in the main street of Matamata, about 9 a.m. to-day, a motorcyclist, Sanford Buchanan, aged 40, a painter, single, of Te Poi, suffered severe head injuries, from which he died in Matamata Hospital at 2 o'clock in the afternoon. Buchanan was riding his motor-cycle toward Matamata from Te Poi, and when he was a few yards from the crossing he swerved to avoid the. engine of the train, and was hit by the second carriage. His motor-cycle fell away from the train and was not damaged.

CYCLIST SUFFERS INJURIES

Minor abrasions about the face, hands, and knees, were suffered by Frank Cusack, aged 53, of 60 Alexandra street, when a cycle he was riding came into collision with a motor-car in Oxford terrace, near the Forester's Hotel, at 6.55 p.m. on Saturday. He was admitted to the Christchurch Hospital.