THREE MEN KILLED

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18588, 24 December 1934, Page 13

THREE MEN KILLED

OAR’S 200,FT PLUNGE

NOT FOUND FOR TWO 'DAYS

' (Per Press Association.) GORE, this day. A motor accident resulting in the deaths' of three meii occurred near Rae’s Junction, About 50 .miles from GOre, last Thursday, the bodies being discovered on Saturday. The deceased are: Andrew Aitken, garage manager, of Gore, 49; William Stiven, farm laborer, 60, of Etlipvale; arid William McPherson Moore, 40, a single man, a commercial traveller employed W the Amalgamated Tobacco Manufacturing Company, Auckland. The deceased were proceeding from Rae’s Junction to Beaumont on Thursday afternoon at about 5 o’clock in a new six-cylinder sedan car, which Aitken had ,taken from Gore that, morning, apparently with the intention of selling to Moore,

About li miles from Rue’s Junction the car went over the side of the road and fell 200 ft. down a steep hill to a gully. Owing to the non-return of Aitken by moon on Saturday inquiries were set on foot, and Charles Benjamin Gollop, a publican at, lute’s Junction, at whose hotel the three deceased called between 4.39 and 5 o’clock on Thursday, set, out with two others. They found a fence broken on the side of the road, and later saw the car in the gully. They scrambled down the hillside and reached the car, which was badly damaged, and. found the bodies half a chain away, all the deceaseds’ necks being broken and other injuries. The police were notified and the bodies conveyed to Rue’s Junction, where an inquest was held yesterday. • At the inquest a verdict was returned that the deceased met death when a car fell 200 ft. down the side of a steep rocky gully, there being no evidence to definitely establish the cause of the car leaving the road. Although the car left Gore with Aitken as the driver, it is surmised that Moore, who intended buying a new car, was later at the wheel. The car was in perfect mechanical condition, and even after the accident the brakes and steering gear were in good order.