RAIL SMASH MYSTERY

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19622, 3 May 1938, Page 3

RAIL SMASH MYSTERY

IDENTITY OF “MAC” THIRD MAN IN ('Alt PASS lON GRIPS SUGGESTION (P«r Press Association.) WELLINGTON, this day. The inquiry into the derailment of the Wellington-New Plymouth excursion train at Ratana on the morning of March 2(1 was continued yesterday. Two passengers referred to the suggestion that a third man was riding on the footplate of the locomotive, but it was stated in evidence that the unknown man referred to as “Mac”, by earlier witnesses could not have been riding in the cab. A woman passenger said she heard a young man say that a railway cadet, whose home was in Wanganui, had travelled on the engine. .

The chairman of the board of inquiry, Sir Francis Frazer, said that the witness had later intimated that he thought the unknown "Mac” might be traced through a telegram sent from Aramoho. A man who may have been “Mac” handed a telegram to a police constable at Aramoho. His identity, said the chairman, might possibly be traced through the telegraph authorities.

Mr. F. C. Aickin, railway law officer, said that the police constable in question had received about 100 telegrams from different passengers. The unknown man might be difficult to trace. Statements Available The chairman said also that the commissioner of police had made various statements made by passengers available to the inquiry. The greater portion of these could probably be disregarded, but counsel would have the opportunity of seeing the statements and any persons who might be of value to the inquiry would be called to give evidence,

Mrs. A. ,T. Hanning, a passenger on the train, said that after the smash she saw a man who was addressed as ■‘Mac.” He had his wife and a little girl about six years of age with him. This man appeared U> be known as “Mac” to quite a number of men. He was very agile and definitely on the younger side of middle-age. He was not wearing a coat and appeared to have a sleeveless pullover on.

The witness said that she did not gel the impression that the man was wearing dungarees. Just before he collapsed he had been assisting the ambulance men to get an injured person through the roof of the carriage. Alter the accident she heard a good deal of conversation among the passengers as to there being a third man on the engine. She did not hear any name mentioned, but she heard it stated that the person was a railway cadet living in Wanganui. She had not heard any suggestion that "Mac” had been riding in the cab of the engine.