NEW BRIGHTON IN DARKNESS.

Hokitika Guardian, 28 December 1917, Page 4

NEW BRIGHTON IN DARKNESS.

STTPOSEI) PRACTICAL JOKE

Wliat appeals to have been rather : stupid practical joke was perpetrated on the New Brighton people on Saturday' night and the result of it was that tho borough was in darkness from about 9.45. p.m., onwards. Some, short time before 9.30. Mr. Joseph Lythgoe, assistant electrical engineer to Mr. E. E. Stark was rung up in Christchurch by a man the gave his name) who, in an agitated manned, informed him that one of tho wires carrying the electric current to New Brighton had broken down and that “some men were hanging oil to them and being killed.”

Mr. Lythgoe promptly telegraphed the power station and had the current .shut off from the New Brighton line, and then taking a taxi ho drove out to New Brighton and tried to find the scene of the reported accident. He drove all over tho borough where the electric wires were placed hut failed to find any suspicion of anything wrong Ho also communicated with the police hut their combined force failed to find anything wrong at all. As it was lata by this time the current was not switched 011 that night, just to make certain and yesterday morning Mr. Lythgoe went to see Mr. Kibblowhitc, Mayor of New Brighton, who could throw no additional light on the affair which appears to have been a silly, hut successful, hoax.