Production of eta and omega mesons in tau decay and a search for second-class currents.

The production of eta and ..omega.. mesons in tau decay has been studied with the CLEO detector. A sample of 42 000 e/sup +/e/sup -/..-->..tau/sup +/tau/sup -/ events at a mean ..sqrt..s of 10.5 GeV is used in the analysis. The branching ratio B(tau/sup -/..--> omega pi../sup -/..nu../sub tau/) is measured to be (1.60 +- 0.27 +- 0.41)%. No signal for eta production from tau decay is observed, resulting in 95%-confidence-level upper limits of 1.8% for B(tau/sup -/..-->..eta..pi../sup -/..nu../sub tau/), 2.1% for B(tau/sup -/..-->..eta..pi../sup -/..pi../sup 0/..nu../sub tau/), and 2.1% for inclusive eta production in tau decay. No evidence is found for decays proceeding via second-class currents.