Deadly rock to be blasted?

Press, 29 October 1981, Page 3

Deadly rock to be blasted?

PA Tauranga A rock in the Wairoa River which has caused several rafting accidents could be blasted apart as a result of a fatal accident there on Sunday. The body of a young Mount Maunganui man was recovered from the river by divers on Tuesday. He was Christopher Neville James Bright, aged 19. He had been missing since being throwm from his homemade raft near the rock. The Tauranga police search controller, Sergeant F. G. Gunst, said yesterday that six divers were used in the search while the river level was low’ered by a pause in generation by the McLaren Falls power station. The body was found “where expected,” Sergeant Gunst said. When found. Mr Bright was not wearing his lifejacket, although he had it on when he was swept overboard.

It is known that in previous accidents at the same spot raft riders pinned to a vertical rock wall by the current have removed (heir lifejackets to get down to a low-pressure area below the surface to escape. Sergeant Gunst said that on Sunday commercial raft operators had decided against using the white water course because the river was too high.

The midstream rock, about 2.4 kilometres below the McLaren Falls power station, forced the current hard against the left bank and there had been several accidents there, said Sergeant Gunst. He said people connected with rafting were keen to get rid of the rock and had undertaken to supply the explosives. the expertise, and

the equipment to destroy it