MOTOR FALLS INTO RIVER

Evening Star, Issue 20486, 17 May 1930, Page 2

MOTOR FALLS INTO RIVER

YOUNG MAN PINNED DOWN AND DROWNED [Per United Press Association.] / ■■ WAIPUKUJIAU', May 16. A fatal accident occurred lute this afternoon on the Makaretu road, three miles south of Ongaonga, as a result of which Frederick William Spotswood, aged 20, lost his life, It appears that three men, employed as a lino party by the Post and Telegraph Department at Waipukurau, wore proceeding along the road. When the lorry was negotiating a bridge over the Tukitnki River the steering gear apparently failed, -precipitating the veliicle through the structure into the river, a distance of 12ft, and pinning Spotswood underneath. The cause of death was apparently drowning. The body was later recovered. The other occupants of the lorry, Claud Page, aged 44, married, and Robert Stabler, aged 20, single, residents of Waipukurau, escaped with lacerations, head bruises, and _ shock. Stabler suffered severe lacerations of tho right leg, necessitating stitches, and both were admitted to the Waipukurau Hospital. Both men struggled from the upturned vehicle and made heroic efforts to lift the lorry, but they wore unsuccessful. Page, although suffering severely, walked some chains to a settler’s residence, and advised the police and a doctor, and also the postal officials. The. mother of tho deceased lost one son in a motor accident, and her husband is dead. Now a second son has been killed within eighteen months.