Man crushed to death by blade

Press, 16 July 1983, Page 10

Man crushed to death by blade

NZPA Melbourne A man was crushed to death yesterday in a private contractor’s rubbish compactor truck in Melbourne’s central business district.

Two men were sleeping in a waste-bin near the corner of Little Bourke and Elizabeth streets when the truck picked it up, said the police. It dumped the men and Rubbish in the compacting section. One of the men was rammed to death by the compactor blade. The other had apparently stood up and the biade missed him. The dead man, who was 27, had arrived in Melbourne earlier this week where he met the other man, Richard Soward, aged 31, at the Gill Memorial Home, a men’s hostel. The police have not yet released the dead man’s name.

A Melbourne city council spokesman said that the rubbish truck was owned by a private contractor and not by the council. Labour and Industry Department officers have joined the police in investigating the death. “The survivor only suffered scratches to his head but he’s pretty shocked,” said a policewoman. The men had been sleeping in a large steel waste bin when the compactor truck arrived shortly before 7 a.m. (local time).

The driver and his codriver told the police that they emptied the bin and, as in normal pick-ups, activated the pressure operated compactor. Then, as they drove off, they heard tapping and then a man screaming.