FATALLY SCORCHED.

Auckland Star, Volume LVI, Issue 215, 11 September 1925, Page 8

FATALLY SCORCHED.

I ■ ■«■ 'MAN FALLS IN REDHOT DUST. I ' WHEN KILN ROOF BREAKS. (From Our Own Correspondent.) SYDNEY, August 27. Four men were precipitated into a pit of scorching dust when the roof of a patent brick kiln, which was being demolished at Bake well's brick works, St. Peter's, on Tuesday, collapsed suddenly. One man has died from his injuries. The man fatally injured was John Joseph Macnamara, aged 32, a labourer, who lived in Lord Street, Newtown. With three other labourers he was engaged in demolishing the kiln, which was 12ft high, 10ft wide, and 60ft long. It is to be replaced by a more up-to-date kiln, and the men had been at work about an hour on Tuesday when the crash came. They were all working on the dome, 'which caved in suddenly, and they all disappeared in a cloud of blinding, scorching brick dust. Inside the old kiln, which had been in use less than 24 hours previously, there was about four feet of brick dust, which retains the heat for days after the fires arc withdrawn, and which was still sufficiently hot to have baked green bricks. When the dust cleared a little rescuers, were able to discern Macnamara buried almost to the neck in the dust, while falling bricks had chocked him in so securely that lie could make no move to free himself. Rescuers hauled two men out to safety, and then started to dig for Macnamara and a man named Horace Ilef-' fernan, who was also hemmed in by the falling bricks. The wOrk of the rescuers was made increasingly difficult by the thick dust, which hung low and made breathing difficult. Eventually they hauled the other two men out, and they we.ro rushed to hospital by tha ambulance, which was waiting for them. Macnamara, who had been through what amounted to an ordeal of fire, was admitted suffering from burns all over the body, legs and arms, fractured right ; leg, and shock, while Heffernan had a j fractured right leg, abrasions to arms, : and shock. He, too, was admitted. i So severe were Macnamara's injuries that he succumbed soon after admisi sion, but the others, two of whom were : only slightly injured, are not regarded as serious cases. No explanation has been made as to the reason' for the sudden collapse of the dome " of the kiln. —: I