CRASH INTO BRIDGE.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 490, 27 June 1932, Page 4

CRASH INTO BRIDGE.

Car Driver Killed Near Waikari. • FOUR PASSENGERS UNHURT. Joseph Prendeville, a single man, was killed instantly when the motorcar he was driving crashed into a small bridge across the Waikari Creek, on the main Ha warden-Waikari Road, at 12.45 a.m. yesterday. Mr Prendeville, with whom were four other occupants of the car, was returning to Waikari after attending a dance .at Waitohi Peaks, some miles from Hawarden. The car struck the handrail of the bridge, and part of the structure crashed through the windscreen and crushed the driver’s chest. The other occupants of the car were ; unhurt. The machine suffered considerable damage. Prendeville was aged thirty-two, and worked in the lime-kiln at Waikari. Dr S. Hunter, of Waikari. was called to the scene of the accident. The passengers in the car were Messrs Thomas R. Gardiner, John B. Smith, James T. Davidson and Stanley F. Campbell, all of Waikari. Evidence at Inquest. Evidence given at the inquest held at Waikari yesterday afternoon was that Prendeville had driven the car both to and from the dance. When the car was about two and a half miles from Waikari on its return those in the back seat noticed that the machine was on the wrong side of the road and that there was a danger of its colliding with the bridge. The occupants called out to the driver, who took no notice, and the car crashed into the bridge, tearing away the whole of the right-hand side. The car pulled up on the other side of the bridge with a broken axle. The top rail of the bridge, a piece of timber measuring four inches by four inches, which had been picked up by the car; went through the cowl of the tody and struck the driver in the chest. Constable W. Kenealy, of. Waikari, stated in evidence that when he arrived on the scene of the accident the men were quite sober. There were no traces of liquor. The Coroner (Mr IT. P. Lawry, S.M.), returned a verdict that the cause of death was severe crushing in the region of the chest and heart.