CAR FALLS 300 FT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22939, 18 January 1938, Page 11

CAR FALLS 300 FT.

PLUNGE INTO KAVINE DRIVER GRAVELY INJURED DIFFICULT RESCUE WORK ROTOMA HILL ACCIDENT [BY TELEGRAPH —OWN- CORTIKS TON I) EN'r] EOTORUA, Monday In one cf the worst motor accidents which has occurred in the Rotorua district for many years, two men were injured, one very seriously, when a small car which was being driven toward Whakatane left the roadway and dropped 300 ft. into a ravine on the Rotoma Hill shortly after 10 o'clock last night. The driver of the car, whose identity 'has not been definitely established, but in whose clothes was found.a driving licence in the name of Hugh Southern Hayes, farmer, of Kai-iwi, near Wanganui, received terrible head and internal injuries, from which he is not expected to recover.

The driver's companion was Mr. Joseph Vjscoe, aged 45, a timber worker. The two men were not known to each other. Mr. Viscoe's injuries are mainly a severed artery on the leg, shock and abrasions, and his condition is not regarded as serious. Eye-witness of Accident

The accident occurred on one of the highest points of the Rotoma Hill route, which has recently been widened by the Public Works Department. At present there is no explanation of. the cause of the car's going over the bank, but it was fortunate that at the time there was another car parked, a few yards farther along the road, and that the driver, Mr. A. Lamb, observed the car leave the road, otherwise the injured men would have almost certainly not been discovered until daylight. Mr. Lamb, who was travelling toward Whakatane, was shortly afterward joined by another passing motorist, whom he sent to the Rotoma public works camp for assistance. Rescue Party Organised A party was quickly organised, and went down into the ravine to give whatever assistance was possible to the injured. Half-way down -they found Mr. Viscoe, 'who had apparently been thrown out of the car and been held up by a tree-trunk. Leaving one of the party to assist Mr. Viscoe, the others went on to the bottom of the declivity, where they found the car lying on its side, badly wrecked, with the driver pinned behind the steering wheel. So serious were his injuries that extreme care had to be taken in carrying him up the steep hill to the roadway, and the trip took over an hour.

B\ r this time the ambulance, doctor and constable who had been called from Rotorua, over 30 miles away, had arrived, and it was found that the driver had a fracture of the base of the skull and several broken ribs, one of which, it was found later, was penetrating a lung. Both men were immediately taken to the Rotorua Public Hospital, where the driver was still unconscious this evening.