Owner Jumps When Launch Explodes

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31775, 4 September 1968, Page 1

Owner Jumps When Launch Explodes

(New Zealand Press Association) AUCKLAND, September 3. A man leapt into the Tamaki River this afternoon when his 25-foot launch exploded in flame.

Reaching his dinghy, Mr A. G. Smith, of 371 Riddell Road, watched helplessly as the launch caught fire from end to end and burned to the wntpr linp Mr Smith said later that when he went out to his boat he found that vandals had got into it.

“There was a terrible mess inside—pies, cakes and beer bottles all over the place,” he said.

They had ripped off wires from the ship-to-shore radio. “There was no smell of

petrol. I opened all the hatches. I touched the starter and she went whoof. 1 went straight into the drink.” Mr Smith said he was in the water about a minute or two before clambering on to his dinghy beside the launch. Firemen from the Mount Wellington station rowed out to the burning launch but could do little to save it. Mr Smith said that the vandals might have been playing with the launch’s refrigerator which had a rock gas cylinder. A spark from the motor could have ignited the gas.