Reporter's Diary

Press, 24 March 1977, Page 2

Reporter's Diary

Breaker break-out

THE SURFER in solitary told an Australian Government inquiry yesterday of the Long Bay Wipeout — the day ne rode out of his prison cell on a shortlived wave. As Charles Sewell, aged 28, told a Royal Commission into prison conditions, it was simply a matter of creating the right conditions in his cell at Sydney’s Long Bay Jail. “It was lovely on a hot day,” he explained. “I used to stuff the cracks round the door with bread and toilet paper. Then I wrenched the toilet from the floor, causing the water to rise up to the window bar level.” With his 100 lido thus created, Sewell would strip off and swim. “I could sit up on the window sill and dive in again, and when the door was eventually opened, I used to surf out to the yard on the rush of the water.” And that was when his cool-off in the cooler ended. But Sewell, who claimed to have spent most of his life in prisons and institutions, added: “I would get a fair way before I hit the ground and skinned my knees and elbows.”

Unaccustomed delay MORE than 1000 passengers were forced to remain aboard the passenger liner Fairstar overnight at Sydney after a Customs mix-up when the ship arrived from Auckland on Tuesday. Hundreds of friends and relatives waited at the dockside when the ship berthed, but they were told they would have to return in the morning to meet disembarking passengers — 12 hours after the Fairstar tied up. Although the ship had been listed in the newspaper shipping columns to berth at II p.m., the Customs Department was not officially informed by the ship’s agents that it was due until it was too late to assign officers to clear the passengers, a Customs spokesman said. However, the crew had been allowed to leave the ship, although their baggage remained aboard. Biblical wall

ISRAELI archaeologists have uncovered par< of a wall that surrounded the

old city of Jerusalem 2000 years ago under King Herod. The 150-metre length was part of a 15metre thick wall which surrounded the city to protect it against enemy onslaught. The wall section is three times as thick as the present city wall, built by the Turks 400 years ago. The Herodian wall was built at the same time as the Second Jewish Temple, of which only the Western Wailing Wall, the holiest site for Jews, remains. Snookered FIREMEN used an electric drill and dish-washing detergent in an hour-long rescue at Kernel Hempstead, England. They were trying to free a housewife, Gill Richardson, whose hand had become struck in the pocket of a pool table. She, in turn, had been trying to retrieve her husband Ken’s false teeth, which had dropped into the pocket while he lined up a shot. The firemen were eventually successful in freeing Mrs Richardson, and obliged by retrieving Mr Richardson’s teeth. Name change REPAINTING of several shop frontages in Gloucester Street over the last week has given the Disabled Servicemen’s Shop, at the corner of Press Lane and Gloucester Street, the chance to have its name “brought up to date.” Because of the dwindling numbers of disabled servicemen, the scope of the workshops provided for them has increased over the years to include many of the civilian handicapped. Gradually, and as the opportunities have arisen, letterheads and the signs on shops throughout New Zealand have been changed from Disabled Servicemen’s to Rehabilitation League, and this change took place in Gloucester Street yesterday. Late letter SOMETHING went very wrong when a United States delegation to Hanoi called On Vietnamese Premier (Pham Van Dong) last week, to give him a personal letter from President Carter. They forgot the letter. One of the delegation made a hurried return to the guest house, and the letter was finally delivered 10 minutes late.

Return to form HE DID it with flare — literally. The Wizard yesterday put on one of his best'shows ever as he “sent his census form to heaven” by setting it alight with a flare. A year ago, he dared the Government Statistician (Mr E. A. Harris) to prosecute him for not filling in the form. Nothing happened. So a victory dance was set for Cathedral Square, and it was performed with a great deal of noise, music, whoops, blessings, and the like. First the Wizard berated all those who work “from 9 to 5” for more than a few

years. Then he showed the crowd what such people looked like by placing a wind-up toy on the ground and abusing it with fireworks and a yellow rubber bunny that squeaked. He blessed the crowd with a pair of chirping toy love birds and stripped to a black costume, making himself look like an overgrown dwarf. He even donned a gas mask to muffled cries of “I won, I won!” during the victory celebration. There hasn’t been so much spark in the old boy for some time. What next?

THE American mania for things odd — such as

pet rocks — has gone a step further with something about as cuddly and as useful. A firm in Buffalo, New York, put on the market this week a special item to commemorate the Buffalo Blizzard of 1977. (Not the descent from the skies of herds of wind-tossed buffaloes, but the snow blizzard which occurred at Buffalo). Allentown Industries is offering a vial of liquefied snow on a special commemorative stand. Each purchase will include a gift card and a booklet of reminiscences from the 1977 winter, which dumped 188 in of snow on New York state’s second-largest city.