SWEPT INTO SEA.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 19581, 30 March 1929, Page 14

SWEPT INTO SEA.

TWO fishermen DROWNED. TRAGEDY AT NEW PLYMOUTH. (P2ESS ASSOCIATION TELEQHAM.) XEW PLYMOUTH, March 29. Two men fishing on the breakwater at the port of Xew Plymouth -were swept off by a huge wave thifi morning and drowned. Thev were Albert Therkle-son, engineer, employed at a foundry, aged 29, a married ihan with four children, and Krnest Edward Thomas, road i oiler driver, employed by the Borough Council, aged about SO, a married man with one child. The bodies had not been recovered this evening. The breakwater, which shelters the harbour, is a wide concrete wall jutting nearly half a mile into the sea. This morning heavy seas driven by a westerly wind were crashing over the wall at intervals-. The two men gained the end of the breakwater by dodging the waves. A number of people who saw them realised their danger, but could do nothing in time to avert the disaster. At the extreme end of the wall the men, although drenched, were seen to commence fishing. Within a few minutes a huge wave crastlied upon the pier, sweeping both men into the seething water. Two boys paddling a canoe in the sheltered water went out and picked up one man's hat, and a Harbour Board launch within a few minutes thoroughly

searched the locality, but the men wers not seen again. Both were experienced fishermen who knew the harbour well, and many resident who had a full view of the tragedy were amazed at their daring in attempting to reach the end of the wall. Thomas, distinguishable bv his size from Therkleson, was seen to bend down as the wave struck the outer side of the wall, and then as the flying water struck him he was sent headlong into the foaming water on the harbour fdde, where it is probable he would strike the ragged rubble flanking the wall. Therkleson, who was standing on a concrete block over the end of the wall, was simply smothered in the frothing wave.