FACTORY FATALITY

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVI, Issue 70, 20 September 1943, Page 3

FACTORY FATALITY

A finding that Sydney»Ronald White, 29, labourer, died at a fibrous plaster works in Daniell: Street on August 26, the cause of death being strangulation as a result of his clothing being caught in a revolving shaft, was made by the Coroner (Mr. W..G. L: Hellish) at the inquest last week. "What the deceased was actually doing at the time is a; matter of pure* speculation," said the Coroner. " -

The evidence'"was-that Mr. White, went to the basement of the building, on the morning of August' 26 to.stpke : the fires there. • In the same room, which was unlighted,' was a fan driven1 iby an electric motor through a shaft abouti 33 inches above the floor. To .stoke all the-fires it was necessary to go to both sides of-the-shaft, which, ran into the middle- of1 the room. Mr. White was foundry a fellowremployee held tight against the shaft by a" loose-ly-knitted pullover he was wearing. Two members of the. United States Marine "Corps who happened to be at th;?'factory tried artificial1 respiration upon him for about an hour without success. An inspector 6t machinery said that because of the roughness of the shaft and the nature of the material in the pullover it would not require much .contact, to. make the garment cling to the shaft. - • . Mr. W./ E: Leicester 'appeared for the employers of Mr. White and1 Mr. A. J. Mazengarb for his relatives.