PINNED BY NECK

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18627, 24 July 1930, Page 11

PINNED BY NECK

UNDER OVERTURNED TRUCK. FARMER'S STRANGE ESCAPE. By Telegraph —Press Association. BLENHEIM, July 23. Pinned by the neck tor over seven hours beneath an upturned motor truck, Mervyn F. Jeffries, a Grasmere farmer, had the amazing good fortune to emerge unscathed from an experience which he will nevertheless remember for the rest of his life. At one o’clock on a recent morning. Jeffries was driving from Blenheim to his home at Grasmere iu a motortruck of the light-delivery type. When proceeding down the southern side of the Lion’s Back, the vehicle for some unaccountable reason suddenly left the road. From the road the hill slopes away steeply, and as the accident happened well up the incline there was a considerable distance down to the floor of the valley. Fortunately, however, after the truck had rolled over once it came up against a fence, which proved strong enough to hold it. Mr Jeffries was tossed from his seat and found himself pinned by the neck and so held by the weight of the machine that, struggle as he would, he could not free himself. Providentially the side of the truck was resting upon a boulder, which was just high enough to keep the weight of the vehicle off his neck. From 1 a.m. Jeffries had to remain in this trying predicament until 8 o’clock, when an Awatere County workman happened to espy him and effected a welcome rescue.

Mr Jeffries did not even suffer serious ill-effects from the lengthy period of exposure and is now none the worse for the experience. The truck was not seriously damaged, the hood and windscreen suffering most.