WALL COLLAPSES.

Press, Volume XLIV, Issue 19391, 17 August 1928, Page 7

WALL COLLAPSES.

LABOURER FATALLY INJURED. [THE PRESS Special Service.] AUCKLAND, August 16. Partially buried by the collapse of a brick wall, Alfred Patrick, aged about 69, was fatally injured this morning. He was assisting to demolish an old house in Franklin road, Ponsonby, at the time of the accident, a few minutes before 10 o'clock. He was working at the rear of the building, the other two men employed on the job being in another part of the partially demolished structure. Startled by the crash of falling, brickwork, the two men at the front of the house went to the back and found Patrick lying face downwards on the floor with his head and shoulders buried in the wreckage. No difficulty was experienced in removing the brickwork and getting the injured man free, but it was found that he was unconscious and in a critical condition. There was a nasty wound on his left temple. The ambulance was summoned, but the ambulance men could do nothing, and the injured man died on his way to hospital. Deceased was a married man and lived in Mount Albert.

The house which Patrick was assisting to pull down was an old brick and concrete one, being one-storey at the front and two at the back. The roof had been taken off, and the greater part of the walls, which were of doable brick, had already been pulled down. It is estimated that the fall that killed him weighed about a ton. The owner of the building is C. Coward, and it 18 being demolished to make room for a block of eight new flats.