CAR CRASHED TO RIVERBED.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17757, 29 January 1926, Page 8

CAR CRASHED TO RIVERBED.

THREE DEATHS CAUSED; INQUIRY AT PALMERSTON.

"Per Press Association. PALMERSTON N„ January 29. The inquiry was resumed to-day into the circumstances surrounding the fatality at Rangiotu Road Bridge on the night of August 16 last, whereby Mrs C. 11. Withers and two sons lost their lives through the car iii which they were travelling crashing through a picket fence and plunging down a steep bank into the Oroua River. The bodies of the two boys, Leonard Peri, aged five, and Jack Herbert, aged twelve, were found later, but the body of Mrs Withers has not been recovered. Charles Herbert Withers gave evidence that on the night of the fatality he was returning from Palmerston North by car. accompanied by his wife and children. Approaching the Rangiotu bridge, gravelling about fifteen miles an hour. his headlights picked up the railway bridge about half a chain from the road bridge. He continued on in the belief that the first-named structure was the road bridge. He suddenly perceived the picket fence in front of the car, and immediately applied the brakes, but was too near the fence to stop the car, and the fence failed to stop the vehicle, which plunged over into the river. His wife and boys were in the back seat. He made endeavours t.o locate theiri. without success. The next thing he remembered was freeing himself and being pulled out of the river. • The Coroner returned a verdict that the two boys were accidentally drowned, apparently due to an error of judgment on the part of Withers in mistaking the approach of the railway bridge for that of the traffic bridge. Further, that at the time there was an element of danger at the locality. It was satisfactory to note from the evidence that steps had been taken to prevent a recurrence of such accidents.