FORTUNATE ESCAPE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 10, 12 January 1934, Page 3

FORTUNATE ESCAPE.

FELL 25 FEET INTO SEA. SHIP'S LADDER UNFASTENED? (By Telegraph.—Own Correspondent) TOKOMARU BAY, this day. Mr. John. Lowe Grant, the chief engineer at the Tokomaru Bay Freezing Works, had a miraculous escape from death while the liner Rangitata was loading produce in the roadstead. He epent the evening with the Rahgitata's chief engineer, and when leaving climhed over the bulwarks and. grasped a rope ladder to reach the deck of the lighter Tiroa. The ladder, apparently, was not fastened and Mr. Grant dropped 25ft into deep water between the lighter and the towering eide of the liner. Answering his call for help as he came to the surface the mate of the Tiroa, Mr. Coleman, grasped and held him until assistance arrived and he was pulled aboard. , He was riven medical attention at the wharf. His injuries, as far as is known at present, are not serious. Mr. Grant is 57 years old and spent 20 years at sea prior to his marriage. He held appointments as chief engineer on several vessels and was on the Tongariro when she became disabled and figured in the world's longest drift. In spite of two decades of seafaring he is unable to swim.