DROVER BADLY SHOCKED

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 29055, 18 November 1959, Page 22

DROVER BADLY SHOCKED

Rode Into Sagging Power Line (N-Z. Press Assoctatton—Copyrioht) SYDNEY, November 17. A badly burned drover last night staggered two and a half miles bacK to his camp after he had survived a 2000-volt shock from a sagging power line near the township of Tottenham, in southern New South Wales. The drover, John Joseph McCormack, aged 43, had been on horseback checking some of the 1150 head of cattle he was driving from Glen Innes, in northerh New South Wales, to Wangaratta, Victoria.

He suddenly came upon the power line, which had been dragged down by a fallen limb, and instinctively shielded his face with his arm. His forearm came in contact with the line about eight feet above the ground. The shock killed the horse Instantly and as it fell, McCormack was thrown clear. The shock scorched the soles from his boots and burnt his hands and feet. McCormack then began the hoUr-long two miles and a half trek back to his camp at Dandaloo, 22 miles north-east of Tottenham. He staggered to within 100 yards of the camp before collapsing. His cries aroused his wife, Elizabeth, who had been travelling with him and their two sons. She called Tottenham police and a constable drove out and brought McCormack to hospital. His condition early today was satisfactory, a doctor said.

“It is not bigotry to be certain we are right: but it is bigotry to be unable to imagine how we might possibly have gone wrong.” —G. K. Cheaterton.