FATAL COLLISION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22909, 17 June 1936, Page 10

FATAL COLLISION

TRAGEDY FOLLOWS FUNERAL

CAR STRIKES TIMBER LORRY

(Per United Press Association)

BLENHEIM, June 16.

Tragedy overtook a party of six Wairan Valley farmers last evening when they were returning home from attending a funeral in Blenheim. Within a couple of miles of Wairau Valley township, on a straight, wide stretch of highway, the car. driven by George Gordon Davidson, collided with a laden timber lorry, with the result that Leonard Leslie Hart, a married man with one child, was killed instantaneously, while Davidson himself is not expected to live. , , When the body of tbc car —a large sedan —was practically ripped off the chassis, the bodywork evidently struck the men on the beads, with shocking consequences. The four other occupants bad a marvellous escape in the circumstances, suffering only from severe shock. The accident occurred just after dark. It can only be assumed that the driver of the ill-fated car miscalculated his margin to pass the lorry, with the result that his windscreen struck the timber alongside the cab of the lorry, the driver of which was Mcrvyn Prentice.