DANGEROUS AS EXPLOSIVE.

Press, Volume LXIX, Issue 20898, 4 July 1933, Page 7

DANGEROUS AS EXPLOSIVE.

+ RISK IN USING SODIUM CHLORATE. A QUAURYMAN CHARGED. fPRF,33 ASSOCIATION \.U.) HAMILTON, July ;j. "This case has been brought by the Department to give publicity to the extreme danger of using sodium chlorate as an explosive," stated Mr R. GirlingButcher, chief inspector of explosives, In the Hamilton Magistrate's Court today, when Robert James Watson, a quarryman, pleaded guilty to a charge of manufacturing chlorate powder for practical use as an explosive. Mr Girling-Butcher, representing the Department of Internal Affairs, said that defendant was employed in a limestone quarry at Te Pahu on March 30. As a substitute for gelignite, Watson mixed sodium chlorate and sugar in equal quantities. Sodium chlorate, pointed out Mr Girling-Butcher, was used to a large extent by farmers for destroying ragwort. Watson had nearly completed loading the charge, and was tapping it in with a wooden stick, when an explosion occurred. As a result, defendant lost two fingers of his left hand, and severely injured an arm. The prosecution was brought with the object of giving publicity to the extreme dangers attendant on the use of sodium chlorate in the manner described. "We have reason to believe that sodium chlorate is used largely by farmers for log-splitting, stumping, etc., and while in many cases no damage might be done, it is. nevertheless, extremely hazardous," Mr GirlingButcher added. "I believe it was said at a farmers' meeting that sodium chlorate was cheap and simple. It might be cheap; but is anything but simple. It is extremely treacherous and hazardous," commented the Magistrate. The defendant was convicted and ordered to pay costs.