CHILD’S DEATH

Southland Times, Issue 25302, 4 June 1935, Page 7

CHILD’S DEATH

PLAYING IN YARD ELECTROCUTED THROUGH POWER CONTACT “LIVE” BEDSTEAD (Per United Press Auckland, June 3. While playing in the back yard of his parents’ home at Blockhouse Bay, Ronald Leslie Rudd, aged five years, was electrocuted. He was the only child of Mr and Mrs L. A., Rudd. When he was last seen alive by Mrs Rudd at 8.45 a.m. he was playing at the rear of his home with another child, aged three years. About 9.15 Mrs Rudd went out to call her son and saw his playmate standing at the front gate. He told her that her son was lying down on the grass at the rear of a galvanized iron shed in the back yard. Hurrying to the shed, Mrs Rudd found her son lying on the ground about 12 inches away from an old iron bedstead which was resting against a wall. Dr Warnock was summoned, but on his arrival life was found to be extinct. Three fingers on the child’s right hand were deeply charred. Later in the morning the two wires which convey power from the house to the shed were disconnected by employees of the Auckland Electric Power Board. An inspection of the installation will be carried out. The power was not in excess of 230 volts. A possible explanation of the accident stated the electrical engineer was that there had been contact between the electrical wiring in the shed and the galvanized iron walls. As a result the walls had become “alive,” the electricity travelling to the iron bedstead which the child had probably touched.