ACCIDENTS & DEATHS

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 55, Issue 46, 4 December 1934, Page 6

ACCIDENTS & DEATHS

A DOUBLE FATALITY. MAN AND GIRL DROWNED. CAUGHT IN UNDERTOW. (Per Press Association). DUNEDIN, Novmber 3. , Caught in a strong undertow at Doctor's Point, Waitaki, about 6.30 this evening, two persons lost their lives. • They were— Mr Ralph Clark, aged about 40, an attendant at Orokonui Home, Waitati. Jovcc Wilson, aged 11, daughter of * Mr T. A. Wilson, of Waitati. It appears that Mr Clark and his wife, who was the only adult witness of the fatality, with a number of younger people and children, were bathing at Doctor's Point, a popular holiday resort, when Mr Clark and the girl were carried away, practically simultaneously, by a strong undertow. Both of them were able to swim, although whether they were strong swimmers is not known. Their strength was evidently not great enough to resist the force of the undertow. Mr Clark's body was recovered about half an hour after the fatality, but late to-iiigTrt the girl's body had not been found, although search parties were immediately dispatched to all the nighhouring beaches with instructions to maintain their search throughout the night. Mr Clark, who was a married man with three children, had been working for about nine months at an attendant at the Orokonui Home, having been employed before that at the Seacliff Mental Hospital. The girl's father is a railway ganger at Waitati: ATTACKED BY BULL. MAN SERIOUSLY INJURED. HASTINGS, December 3. Serious injuries were inflicted on Mr George Young, at Havelock North, on Saturday afternoon, when a Jersey bull, which he was letting out of a gate, attacked him. Mr Young was taken to hospital and operated on, and his condition to-day was satisfactory. The bull was reared as a pet and had not previously shown any tendency to attack.. A few months ago a Jersey bull which was also reared as a pet fatally gored its owner in similar circumstances at Hastings. FOUR FINGERS SEVERED. MASTERTON, Dec 3. A well-known Masterton butcher, Mr A. Rippon, had four fingers of his right hand severed early this afternoon in an electric mincing machine at his shop. He was taken to the hospital and is progressing satisfactorily. DROWNED WHILE BATHING. I DUNEDIN, This Day. An inquest was held this morning on David Vincent Rc-ss, a. single man, ager 27, who was drowned yesterday afternoon at Ravensbourne. The evidence disclosed that deceased, who was employed in the fertiliser works, was an indifferent swimmer, and got into difficulties during a lunch hour bathe. His companions were unable to rescue him. A verdict of accidental drowning was returned INFANT FATALLY SCALDED. HAMILTON, December 3. As a result of falling into a bucket of boiling water and caustic soda prepared for flushing out a separator plant at her parents' home in Waharoa, a child aged three years, Clarice Nellie Ardern, died in the Waikato 1 Hospital yesterday. She was severely ! burned on the body. BOY KILLED IN LIFT. AUCKLAND, Dec. 3. An accident in which a boy was fatally injured through being caught between the floor of a hydraulic goods lift and the side of the lift well, in a Queen Street building on November 16, was the subject of an inquest before Mr P. K. Hunt, S.M., sitting as coroner. The boy, Harold William Kvle, aged 14, who was employed in a building by Silknit (N.Z.), Limited, lived in Grey Lynn. Evidence was given by John Rutland, an assistant in the shipping department of the firm, that he was about six yards from the lift. The boy was placing cans of rubbish in the lift, which' was vsed only for carrying, goods The witness heard the boy call out "Stop, stop," and he then noticed that the lift was rising and that the boy was jammed. He had been placing cans in the lift to take them to the ground floor. When the witness reversed the lift, the body was released and fell to the bottom of the well. On hearing a description of the lift, the coroner commented that there was no roof and that the Hit was really a travelling platform. Michael Connery, director and general manager of the firm, said he had warned Kvle, who had been employed about a fortnight, on the day before his death, about going into the lift, Ernplovees had been warned repeatedlv iff this regard. The witness thought the boy probably tried to scramble on to the lift -when it was rising. . Harry McGregor, a machinery inspector", said he found the controls of the lift an order. The lift was very slow, and even if it had been started

from above the boy should have been able to alight. The boy's intention, witness thought, was probably to start the lift and ascend in it, but thinking he might meet someone in authority he decided to alight. The witness said there were in Auckland 88 goods lifts of similar type. The coroner said the verdict would be that Kvle was killed accidentally, although it was not possible to determine exactly how he met his death. He proposed to inspect the lift.