DEATH STRUGGLE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 832, 28 April 1910, Page 4

DEATH STRUGGLE.

SWIMMER’S HERIOC EFFORT.

A fatal attempt to swim the Niagara Rapids was witnessed by hundreds of horrified spectators yesterday (wired the New York correspondent of the Daily Mail) when an eighteen-year-old boy named August Sporer was caught by the torrent while bathing.

With three companions Sporer went to swim in the quiet waters beneath the falls, where the little steamer Maid of the Mist used to make daily landings. He struck out for the middle of the river, heedless of the cries of his comrades, who warned him that the current was too swift, and reached the drift before he noticed his peril. Then he tried desparately to turn, but could not. The river runs at this point at twelve miles, increasing lower down to thirty miles an hour. The boy, realising the impossibility of human aid, deliberately|swam down the gorge in an heroic effort to accomplish what Captain Webb, the famous swimmer, died in attempting.

His fight for life was watched by crowds of people. Never in the history of the rapids was such a brave struggle witnessed. Sporer went into the rapids, swimming strongly, and held his own until he reached the Giant Wave, which curls backwards to a height of 30ft. It was this wave, as an old photographer has frequently told me, that broke Captar Webb’s bar'- . The boy disappeared here for a moment and then reappeared, being flung by the succeeding wave high above the surface of the waters.

Holding his body erect, the young swimmer battled on, appearing and disappearing at least a dozen times before his strength was exhausted. He sank after swimming a hundred yards further than the famous English swimmer. To-day his body can be seen in the Whirlpool. The river men are waiting for it to be carried tar enough inshore to be recovered.