ACCIDENT AT NGATEA.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVI, Issue 4900, 9 November 1925, Page 2

ACCIDENT AT NGATEA.

SEVERE ELECTRIC SHOCK. CONTACT. WITH MAIN LINE. News was received just as were were going to press that Mr L. Curtis, an employee of the Thames Electric Power Board in a construction, gang, was injured this morning through coming in contact with an ILOOO-volt, main while working on the NgateaKaihere circuit. f It appears that the gang was affixing a new low tension wire on the bottom arm of .the poles carrying the high tension' line. Curtis, who was working on the arm of one of the , poles, wished to alter his position, and to do so he climbed on to the arm and seized hold of ,the high tension wire to steady himself. The shock threw the unfortunate man the pole, which is 30ft high, and he landed, on his back on some soft peat a distance of twenty yards away from the pole. That the electric current passed right through Curtis seems fairly evident, as when he was picked up it. was found that one hand and a small, toe were badly burned, and. he is also . suffering from bruises. The injured man was carried into a nearby hut by his fellow workmen, where he was awaiting the services of a doctor, who had not arrived from Paeroa. In an interview after the accident Curtis stated that when he was detailed for the work this morning he asked the foreman if the power was cut off the main line, and was told that the party would have been advised if the.power had not been cut off as usual.