SON TOSSED TO SAFETY

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28784, 3 January 1959, Page 15

SON TOSSED TO SAFETY

Mother Falls Down Cliff

"The Press’ Snectal Service

NAPIER, January 2. A mother threw her eight-month-old baby boy to safety as she fell down a sheer cliff face on Te Mata Peak,, near Havelock North, on Thursday evening. The baby landed safely on a grassy strip at the cliff edge. The woman, Mrs Beryl McKenzie, aged 35, of Wellington, tumbled 200 feet before catching in a crevice in the cliff face. . Before the accident Mrs McKenzie was standing on the top of a fence at the cliff edge with the baby in her arms. She had climbed there to get- a better; view. Suddenly she became dizzy and as she fell she threw her I baby back over her head towards! her husband, who was with their] two other children and Mrs, McKenzie’s brother. The baby was snatched unhurt as it lay at the edge of the cliff. I Mrs McKenzie, bruised and cut,; was only semi-conscious after the fall. As she lay in the crack in' the cliff face the two men; clambered down to aid her. They, were unable to return or to move! further down. ■ Police, ambulance: and fire brigadesmen were called; to help. | After about two hours a party! led by Police-Sergeant J. Bryant: climbed 500 feet up from the' bottom of the cliff arid reached Mrs McKenzie. i The men. too, were by then: suffering from shock and in need of first aid. Mrs McKenzie was taken to the Memorial Hospital, Hastings.