Coroner unable to make finding

A coroner has been unable to determine whether a young man who lay down on Wairarapa train tracks intended to commit suicide.

Kieran Patrick Gallagher-Power, 25, died on Masterton railways tracks, near Waingawa Bridge, Ngaumutawa Rd, last September 5, of the effects of "multiple injuries" when he ran out on to the tracks and laid down in front of a southbound KiwiRail train.

The report found Mr Gallagher-Power, who suffered from a psychotic disorder, may have been having a psychotic episode due to a lack of medication and could not be sure whether "he was capable of forming the necessary intent to take his life".

Post mortem blood studies showed he was not taking the antipsychotic medication prescribed for him.

"The absence of such medication might have lowered the threshold for impulsive action.

"This raises a doubt as to whether his actions were volitional in nature or might have had their genesis, in whole or in part, in psychosis," the report states.

Prior to his death, Mr Gallagher-Power, a Canterbury University graduate, had been living in a Marist community house for young people in Lower Hutt.

On the morning of his death, he took a train to Masterton and appeared to get off at Solway Station. He walked to the side of the railway track at the rear of Solway School, Ngaumatawa Rd, and lay down on the track with his head over one side of the rail and his legs over the other.

In his evidence, train driver Adam Ford said before crossing the bridge he had been distracted by a pile of grass and had only seen Mr Gallagher-Power lie down on the track when he was about five metres away.

He initially thought Mr Gallagher-Power was just leaving it "a bit late to cross in front of me.

"But that soon immediately changed when he didn't continue crossing in my path, when he laid down in front of me and looked up at the sky, I knew straightaway that he didn't fall. I knew straightaway that he'd intentionally laid down in front of me."

Mr Ford said he applied the emergency brake at about the same time as the train struck Mr Gallagher-Power and was travelling at about 80km/h.