FELL FIFTY FEET

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 84, Issue 86, 13 April 1940, Page 8

FELL FIFTY FEET

“ ■ • STOREMAN’S DEATH IN HOSPITAL TERRIBLE INJURIES WELLINGTON, April 12. Falling 50 feet from a fourth-floor window on to the street verandah of the Wairarapa Farmers’ Co-operative Association’s building in Lambton Quay at 6.10 to-night, a man employed by the firm as head storeman received injuries which resulted in his death in the Wellington Public Hospital less than an hour and a-half later. The victim was William Redmond, of 36 Rata Road. Hataitai, a returned soldier, aged 57. Redmond received a fractured skull, fractured right thigh, compound fracture of the right leg, and a severe lacerated wound to the left shoulder. He was admitted to hospital semi-conscious. The street was crowded with shoppers at the time of the accident and a crowd of several hundred collected in a few minutes. To reach Redmond, ladders had to be obtained and placed against the verandah. He was lowered on a sling stretcher borrowed from the nearby rooms of the Tramping Club, to an ambulance wailing in the street below. Redmond was alone in the store on the fourth floor and it is not known how the accident occurred. It appears, however, that he tripped or overbalanced when close to the window, as he fell through the glass. The sill of the window' is only 18 inches from the floor.