MAORI ELECTROCUTED

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24913, 12 May 1942, Page 2

MAORI ELECTROCUTED

UNUSUAL FENCING ACCIDENT (Special) AUCKLAND, May 11. One man was electrocuted and another had a remarkable escape from death when an unusual accident befel a party engaged on fencing operations on a Native development scheme block near Mourea, 15 miles from Rotorua. The man killed was a Maori, Keepa Taikehu, aged 45 years, married, with eight dependents. Evidence given at the inquest at Mourea showed that Taikehu was one of a party working on the Okere development area. They were repairing a fence running up both sides of a gully 50 feet deep, across which ran a high-tension ' power line in the opposite direction to the fence. The deceased was standing on the top of one side of the hill and the foreman on the other, the remaining two men being ip the swamp below. A length of barbed wire was being stretched across the swamp. The wire caught in an obstruction, and the foreman gave it a tug to free it.. The wire swung upward and came into contact with the power line. The foreman, who was still holding one end of the wire, was temporarily stunned, and Taikehu, who had hold of the other end. was electrocuted. It is believed that, had the end of the wire held by the foreman not been touching the ground, he also would have been killed instantly.