MAN BELIEVED DROWNED

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25389, 12 January 1948, Page 6

MAN BELIEVED DROWNED

LOST AFTER SAVING DAUGHTER

PROMINENT TREASURY OFFICIAL

(P.A.) -WELLINGTON, January 11. After rescuing his daughter, aged 11, when she got into difficulties while bathing at Raumati South this afternoon, Dr. Athol Reay Ferguson Mackay, Second-Assistant Secretary to the Treasury, himself got into difficulties snd is believed to have been drowned. No trace of his body had been found at a late hour 9 to-night. Dr. Mackay’s daughter, Valerie, and Clare Childs, aged about 12, of Raumati, had been bathing at about 5.30 p.m. when Clare Childs reported that Valerie Mackay was in difficulties. Dr. Mackay immediately, went out, followed by a Mrs Holland. He was bringing his daughter in when she was taken from him by a stranger, thought to have been a member of the Manly Life-Saving Club, Sydney, who applied successful resuscitative measures. Mrs Holland was returning to the beach When she noticed that Dr. Mackay was missing. The alarm was immediately given, and within a few minutes members qf the Paekakariki Life-Saving Club had a reel and line on the spot. A full muster of club members took part in the search for Dr. Mackay. There was a fair, surf running at the time, and the efforts of the life-saving team were unsuccessful.

Two aircraft belonging to the Wellington Aero Club left Rongotai about 6.40 p.m. to join in the search, but the pilots had seen nothing of the missing man when they returned shortly after 8 o’clock.

Dr. Mackay, whose home was at Homewood avenue, Karori, Wellington, is survived by his wife, daughter, and a son. He was on holiday at the beach.

BOY KILLED BY FALL FROM HORSE ACCIDENT ON FARM '(P.A.) AUCKLAND, January 11. A nine-yeaj-old boy was killed on his parents’ farm on Saturday morning when the horse he was. riding stumbled and fell on him. The child was Terence Robertson Constable, of Russell’s road, Muriwai. The boy was seen riding the horse in a paddock near his home about 9.45 a.m. by his father. When he looked again he saw the horse lying on the ground. He rushed out and found his son lying beneath the horse. The long rope reins were' entangled around the horses’ hind legs and the boy’s neck and the horse was attempting to rise to its feet. The boy had multiple injuries. APPRENTICE DIES AFTER SHOCK ACCIDENT AT BLACKBALL STATE MINE When he came into contact with a live wire while he was repairing an electric winch at the Blackball State Mine on Saturday, an apprentice electrician received a shock from which he died a few minutes later. He was Keith David Cochrane, aged 18, a single man of Blackball. Cochrane was working with another apprentice, Hugh McDougall, when the accident occurred. He fell unconscious after receiving the shock. Cochrane lived at Blackball with hie sister, Mrs J. Lowe. An inquest was opened yesterday by the Coroner (Mr M. J. Fogarty), and was adjourned after evidence of identification had been given. GIRL DROWNED ON FARM (P.A.) AUCKLAND, January 11. A five-year-old girl, who wandered away from her home at Wainui on Saturday, was later found drowned in a water-hole on a farm. She was Margaret Fay Middleton, of Horseshoe Bend road, Wainui. The child left her home about noon on Saturday. A farmer found her body in the hole about three- miles away at 8 o’clock on Saturday night.

MAN INJURED IN FALL FROM WINDOW Suffering from severe back and head injuries, William Cecil Campbell, 324 Hereford street, was admitted to the Christchurch Public Hospital at 8.40 o’clock on Saturday evening. He received the injuries when he fell from an upstairs window at his home. He was still on the seriously ill list last evening.