MISSING MAN FOUND

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28766, 11 December 1958, Page 3

MISSING MAN FOUND

Calls Heard By Women (From Our Own Reporter) GREYMOUTH, December 10. • A Greymouth man. Percy Basil Rathbun, who has been missing since Friday last, was found this morning by a police party under Sergeant T. J. Steele in the thick bush on the Omoto hill. Members of the West Coast Alpine Club assisted in the search. Mr Rathbun was conveyed into Greymouth in the police van and was taken to the Greymouth Hospital for attention. He was u r eak, thirsty and hungry when brought down the hill on a portable stretcher, but otherwise was in fairly good condition considering his long absence from civilisation. During the last few days, several women whose houses are in the vicinity have heard cries and calls, but, thinking they came from railwaymen or children, they did not take much notice. About 7 o’clock yesterday morning, however, Mrs E. Kenning and Mrs T. Birchfield made replies when they heard the voice and then heard caller identify himself as Basil Rathbun. They immediately notified the police and directed them to where the calls had been coming from. It took the police party some time to locate the missing man, and the area where he was discovered was muddy and slippery, covered with dense bush and particularly steep. It also took some time to bring Mr Rathbun down the hill. A Press Association message from Greymouth says that Mr Rathbun, a retired railway worker, is not a strong man, but undertook a traverse of the hills behind Greymouth last Friday, getting into difficulties in rugged country, until today he was in an exhausted state. He was not, however, injured otherwise by his experiences outdoors for almost six days, during some of which he£.vy rain fell.