FIGHT IN MID-AIR.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 2342, 15 October 1921, Page 1

FIGHT IN MID-AIR.

POLICEMAN AND MADMAN

STRUGGLE ON BRIDGE TOWER,

Thousands of persons, powerless to render aid, watched two policemen fight for their lives with a madman on a narrow girder of the Williamsburg Bridge, New York, 365 feet above the East River.

A man was observed on top of one of the towers of the bridge, dancing, waving his arms,, and shrieking. Two policemen climbed up one of the suspension cables which affords a bare foothold and slopes at a terrifying angle. When he saw them approach, the madman slid down another cable on the other side of the tower.

Below on the roadway and in the streets ashore thousands gasped and held their breaths tensely as they saw one of the policemen miss his hold and topple, orily to recover his balance —fly-like, it seemed, to the anxious watchers —and make a second attempt to reach the wriggling, squirming figure on the girder. This time the policemen were successful. Seizing him by the legs, the two dragged the man toward them until one got a grip on his shoulders.

A hair-raising fight followed, the madman struggling and kicking in his effort to free himself from the policeman’s grip. The second policeman, crawling along on his stomach, seized his comrade’s foot in time to prevent the two struggling men falling into the river, and slowly dragged both of them upward to a narrow parapet. Here the madman was less hampered, and he renewed the fight with fury. The crowds below held their breath as they saw the three men swaying over the edge. More policemen, however, were already climbing like flies up the bridge cables. They reached the parapet, and eventually subdued the madman, sliding him down to safety. When at length they reached the broad roadway of the bridge, scores of automobile horns and hoarse whistles of tug-boats in the river set up a roar of exultation, joined in by the voices of onlookers from nearby housetops, streets, and even Manhattan Bridge, a short distance

upriver. Policeman Kelly, reporting the rescue to his superiors, wrote: “At 1 p.m., saw a man on the top of the New York lower of the Williamsburg Bridge waving his arms and acting in an insane manner. Immediately proceeded to top of the tower with Policeman .Quealy, and brought him down on a cable.”