28 January,2009 10:08 AM IST | | Agencies
Britain's Queen Elizabeth II escaped assassination in Australia nearly 40 years ago when plotters tried to derail her train on a mountain pass.
Former detective superintendent Cliff McHardy told the Lithgow Mercury a large log was placed on the winding track in front of the train carrying the monarch and her husband Prince Philip to the town of Orange on April 29, 1970.
The royal train hit the log at Bowenfels in the Blue Mountains, 150 kilometers from Sydney, but did not shoot off the tracks and down a steep embankment as it was going too slowly at the time, according to news reports.
McHardy, now 81, said he was breaking his silence on the alleged plot, which has been kept under wraps for nearly four decades, in a bid to flush out information on the culprits, who were never arrested.
"It was one of the big regrets of my police service," McHardy told the Mercury, his local paper.
"We never came up with any decent suspects because if we interviewed people we seemed to be talking in riddles. We couldn't disclose what our inquiries were about" because of the secrecy, he said.
The Mercury said the royal train struck the log in a railway cutting after it was rolled down an embankment and then placed across the tracks.
"The train continued on under brakes for about 200 metres with the log still wedged under the front wheels before finally coming to a halt at the level crossing near Bowenfels station," the paper said.
The incident could not have been an accident or simple vandalism, McHardy reportedly said, as the log was rolled into place after a special locomotive had swept the tracks for security, but before the royal train passed.
