HOSPITAL PATIENT’S FATAL BURNS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 90, Issue 55, 7 March 1946, Page 3

HOSPITAL PATIENT’S FATAL BURNS

FELL ASLEEP WHILE SMOKING (P.A.) Auckland, March 6. An elderly patient in the Auckland Hospital died early this morning from extensive burns received when his bed in the hospital ward caught fire about midnight on Tuesday. He was Richard Maney, aged 80, retired, of Pitt Street, city. Maney was admitted to the Auckland Hospital on January 18 suffering from a broken leg received when he fell at his home. After being in one of the lhain wards he was shifted to a single room in a ward on the ground floor. It is understood an attendant is stationed in the ward at nights to supervise the patients. A few minutes before midnight on Tuesday a nursing sister was walking to the ward when she saw smoke issuing from a ventilator in the cuter wall of the building. She rushed inside and found Maney's bed ablaze and the patient lying unconscious on the bed. The fire was controlled by members of the hospital staff within a few minutes and Maney was given medical attention. The bedclothes and the mattress were destroyed and one of the concrete walls of the room was scorched by fire. It is thought the fictim was overcome by smoke soon after the fire began, as no cries for assistance were heard. It is understood one of his legs was encased in plaster at the time. He received severe burns to one foot and other parts of his body and died at 7 o’clock this morning.

It is stated that all cigarettes and matches had been taken from Maney as the usual precautionary measure, but it is thought a person who had been visiting him during the evening may have obtained cigarettes an.: matches for him. He was a heavy smoker and it is considered probable that the fire started when he fell asleep smoking in bed.