Two die on highway in deadly ride home
"Take your time and stay on the correct side of the road so tragedies like this don't occur." Canterbury rural area commander Inspector Peter Cooper
A man remains in a critical condition after a head-on crash north of Christchurch that left two other men dead.
The two men who died in the crash on State Highway 1 on Sunday were Tauvale Ene, 40, and Sione Faraimo, 30.
The colleagues had been working in Culverden and were returning to their homes in Christchurch about 3.45pm, Sergeant Colin Stewart said.
The men, who were in a southbound stationwagon, collided with a north-bound ute towing a trailer near Pa Rd, south of Woodend.
The two men in the ute, believed to be brothers, were flown in a rescue helicopter to Christchurch Hospital.
A Canterbury District Health Board spokeswoman said one of the men was in a critical condition and the other was in a stable condition.
An investigation to determine the cause of the crash is ongoing.
Both vehicles were ‘‘extensively’’ damaged, police said. One of the vehicles caught fire after the crash but a member of the public put it out.
Canterbury rural area commander Inspector Peter Cooper said the station wagon had crossed the centre line and crashed headon into the ute.
‘‘We don’t know why yet. It’s a dead straight piece of road,’’ Cooper said.
He urged people to ‘‘take your time and stay on the correct side of the road so tragedies like this don’t occur’’.
The crash is the second double fatality in Canterbury in less than a week.
Ong See Yee, 29, and her husband Chin Tze Hau, 38, technology executives from Singapore, were killed when their Jucy rental van crossed the centre line and collided with a ute on State Highway 1 near Dunsandel, about 40 kilometres southwest of Christchurch, on Thursday.
The driver of the ute was taken to hospital with non-life threatening injuries.