ON CHIMNEY TOP

Hokitika Guardian, 16 September 1931, Page 5

ON CHIMNEY TOP

STEEPLEJACK’S ORDEAL.

ROCHESTER (N.Y.,) September 4

Nerves of steel and a stout heart kept James Kemp, despite his 63 years clinging to his precarious foothold on the top of a 150-foot chimney until he was rescued two hours lat-

The scaffold on which he and his mate, Diprimo, stood, had broken, and Diprimo had plunged to his death. Kemp felt the scaffold slip, and grasped a rope. He saw Diprimo hurtle downwards. With a bump Kemp was swung against the chimney, and clung there on the ledge, with the middle of his body bent outward by a bulge in tile brickwork.' In tlie face of a stiff breeze, the s'ightest movement meant death. Nauseated by his companion’s death, he watched the desperate rescue attempts while a crowd of many thousands gathered to watch the drama. Firemen with an outstretched lifenet waited for the fall that seemed inevitable. Another crew of firemen fired lifelines over the top of the stack with a rope-gun. The fifth shot draped the rope over, and slowly, foot by foot, Kemp'drew up a heavier line with a sling attached. In this, he collapsed in a dead faint when he reached the ground unharmed.