CRASH OVER BANK

Greymouth Evening Star, 8 March 1943, Page 4

CRASH OVER BANK

CAR PASSENGERS INJURED.

The six occupants of a sedan motor-car had a remarkable escape from death when the vehicle capsized while negotiating a bend on the Reefton-Greymouth highway near Dobson, at about 6 a.m. yesterday, crashing 35 feet to the railway line below. The car somersaulted several times in its descent and landed upside down . It was raining heavily at the time, and visibility was stated to be bad.

The car, which was returning from the sports and dance at Nelson Creek, was driven by Mr. David Green, of Blaketown, and was badly damaged, but the driver escaped injury. However, three of the other occupants were not so fortunate and after being conveyed by ambulance and receiving attention by Dr. Kent were admitted to the Grey Hospital about 7 a.m.

Edward Tarling, aged 29, married, a miner, of Dobson, suffered a fractured spine. His condition is serious, but was reported this morning to have improved. Thomas William Tarling, aged 29, a miner, of Blaketown, and his wife, Maisie Ethel Tarling, aged 28, both received minor injuries, abrasions, and cuts, and experienced shock. Their condition this morning was satisfactory and improving. Mrs. Eileen Tarling, the wife of Edward Tarling, received minor injuries, but was not detained in hospital? . Mr. William McLean, ot Greymouth, the other passenger, escaped injury. The car wreckage blocked the railway line, and when the morning rail-car reached the scene it was delayed for 25 minutes while the passengers assisted the maintenance staff to remove the wreckage to the side of the track. With the aid of a breakdown, truck it was later removed from the scene.

FATAL COLLISION.

CHRISTCHURCH, March 7.

Sidney James Smith, aged 40, of 94 Sherborne Street, who received severe head injuries when a motorcar in which he was a passenger collided with a train at Belfast on Thursday, died in the Christchurch Public Hospital on Saturday. Lester Feutz and Thomas Gifford Lawson, two of the other injured men, are still on the seriously ill list, from which the names of John Dobbin and John Stevenson have been removed.