RAISED FROM LAKE

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 2, Issue 228, 19 May 1932, Page 6

RAISED FROM LAKE

WRECKED MOTOR-CAR UNIQUE SALVAGE WORK WITH PONTOON AND WINCH ROTOITI ACCIDENT A unique piece of motor salvage work was carried out last week-end in connection with the raising of a wreeked motor-car which crashed over a cliff beyond Sixteen Mile bay_ on the Rotoiti road and had to be raised out of 54 feet of water at the foot of the cliff. The car was driven by Mr. H. O. Wyles, a commercial traveller, who had a miraculous escape from death or serious injury. At the point where the car left the road, the cliff falls in a steep slope to the lake but Mr. Wyles was able to escape from the driver's seat before the vehicle was submerged. When investigations were made for the purpose of salvage however,^ it was found that the wreeked machine was lying in 54 feet of water and so deep that it could not be distinguished from the surface. The task of locating it was one of peculiar difficulty and was finally only accomplished by sending down a Maori who worked his way down the anchor rope of a dingy into the. deep water where the car was lying. An effort was then made to raise the machine from a salvage truck on the road, but it was found quite impossible to move it.

Finally it was decided that unusual methods would have to be employed to meet an unusual situation. Arrangements were made for thd hire of a large timber pontoon, which was towed up the lake from Mourea by launch and moored over the submerged car. Grappling irons were then lowered and after considerable trouble, were gripped on to the machine. A heavy winch on the- pontoon was then used to raise the car from the water, but it was found that it . could not be slung over the side owing to its position. The pontoon was accordingly towed into shallow water with the car still suspended, and the machine was then lowered on to the sand and hoisted again in a position which enabled it to be placed on the raft. It was then towed back to Mourea where it was loaded .on to a lorry and brought into Rotorua en route to Auckland. Although the body-work of the car was torn completely from the chasis and scattered on the cliff side and in the lake, the chassis itself was comparatively little damaged. None of the tryes was punctured and with the execption of a broken steering wheel and a dent on one mudguard, a fall of over fifty feet down the cliff and the immersion in deep water had remarkably little effect.