TRAGEDY IN NEW RIVER ESTUARY

Southland Times, Issue 23773, 22 March 1939, Page 9

TRAGEDY IN NEW RIVER ESTUARY

Accidental Drowning

CORONER’S VERDICT AT INQUEST

A verdict of accidental drowning was returned by the Coroner (Mr R. C. Abernethy, S.M.) at the inquest yesterday into the deaths of the four vic tims of the fatality in the New River estuary on February 11. The Coroner expressed his sympathy with the families which had suffered this overwhelming tragedy. The victims were Thomas Victor -naggerty, aged 39 years, labourer; Hilary Leslie Haggerty, aged 11 years; James Popenhagen, aged 35 years, labourer, and Frank Herbert Rask, aged 27 years, Sergeant J. Courts, who conducted the inquest, said that the party had gone fishing at night in the estuary. _ A severe squall had sprung up during the night and it was assumed that the men and boy had been in a dinghy at the time and had been overwhelmed by the storm and drowned. ■ Ellen Alexandria Haggerty, widow of Thomas Victor Haggerty, said that on Friday, February 10, her husband arranged to go netting flounders at Sandy Point in the New River estuary with Erank Herbert Rask and James Popenhagen. ' Her son, Hilary Leslie Haggerty, 11 years of age, who frequently accompanied his father on similar t rl PS> also went with the party. Her husband was owner of the launch in which the trip was made. They intended to leave the Invercargill jetty at 9 p.m. and they left home at 8.40 p.m. The party intended to return home at 5 or 6 o’clock next morning, but failed to do so. Her husband was familiar with the locality where the party intended to fish, having been making regular expeditions to the estuary for the last eight years. . Evidence of finding the bodies of the victims of the fatality was given by Robert David Scott, bakers’ labourer, Walter Mitchell, machinist, and Sergeant Courts. “The weather on the night of Friday, February 10, was calm and mild and apparently ideal for a trip of this nature,” said the sergeant. “About one o’clock in the morning, however, a violent squall blew up from the southwest with a high wind and heavy rain. It lasted for about an hour and then eased.”