CAR OVER CLIFF

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 76, Issue 286, 4 December 1933, Page 8

CAR OVER CLIFF

LADY PASSENGER KILLED CHILDREN SERIOUSLY HURT DRIVER'S MIRACULOUS ESCAPE. 1 Per Press Association. I CHRISTCHURCH, Dec. 3. A sedan car driven by David Ludecke, of Dam pier Street. Woolston, factory overseer, ran over a steep bluff at Corsair Bay, Lyttelton, into the harbour 200 "feet, below. The driver and three passengers of the car were all thrown out. The driver escaped serious injury, but the other three were injured, one fatally. The victims of the accident were: Mrs. Jessie Harris, aged 30, 126 McKenzie Avenue, Woolston. Died from injuries a few minutes after being picked up. George Stant, aged 8. and Kevin Scant, aged 6, both seriously injured aud taken to hospital. Ludecke was trying to park his car on the roadside overlooking the bluff, but backed over the edge, and the car somersaulted over the cliff. A man who was fishing on the rocks below at the time had a narrow escape from injury, being struck on the shoulder by a piece of the broken car. A message at midnight states that the boys w 7 ho were seriously injured are reported to have improved. An eyewitness of the accident said that when Ludecke backed his car off the road to park it. the car appeared to gather speed. It seemed as if the driver had inadvertently put his foot on the accelerator instead of the brake. The ear crashed 'through th® fence, immediately turned over backwards, and so continued hurtling end over end until it crashed on the rocks at the sea level.