FATAL ACCIDENT.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9636, 30 October 1909, Page 5

FATAL ACCIDENT.

By Telegraph—Press Association. CHRSITCHURCH, October 28. At the inquest concerning the death of John Taylor, a railway porter, who was killed at Southbrook yesterday morning, Richard John Stone, who was driving the north express tiain, stattd that when approaching Southbrook at a speed of from tweive to fifteen miles an hour, iw noticed the tablet porter walking along the platform towards the cabin. The porter went inside the cabin, and got the tablet in a sling. He returned to the edge of the platform, held his tablet up in th» proper way„but seemed to over-balance himself as the cab of the engine came level with him. He made a step to save himself, and the cab struck one of bis arms, twisting him round, and before he oould recover, the tablet on the engine struck him on the sidfi of the head. As he lay on the platform, before the train could be pulled up, three steps on the nearest carriages also struck him The exchanger on the engine was of cast-iron, and the Mow Snapped it off. The exchanger projected about one and a-half inches from the engine; Taylor was probably dead before being put on the twin for conveyance to''Rangiora«i The Coroner returned a verdict of "JDeatb accidentally caused while exchanging tablets."