Week’s terrible road toll hits 13
After a week of deadly crashes around New Zealand, one community fed up with death have taken matters into their own hands.
Volunteer firefighter Paul Hannagan, who responded to a fatal crash on Wednesday, was among Twizel community members who erected a warning sign near the intersection of Tekapo-Twizel Rd and Mt Cook Rd yesterday.
The crash killed 42-year-old Qin Li, one of 13 to die on roads this week. Wednesday was the deadliest, adding five lives to New Zealand’s road toll – now 251 for 2018.
The Ministry of Transport has yet to update the toll to include the two who died in crashes yesterday, and another who died three-days after a crash in Waimauku on Wednesday.
Another crash killed motorsport photographer Kevin Corin, struck and killed by a car during a rally at Hanmer Springs, on Saturday.
The first was on Monday, just after midnight, when Rita Ataahua Peka, 38, died in a crash on Galatea Rd, near Lake Matahina, 50km west of Whakata¯ ne.
A two-vehicle crash on State Highway 1, Waitara, killed a woman driver on Tuesday morning. The driver of the other vehicle was uninjured.
Casey Atutahi, 22, was in the backseat of a car when it hit a wall in New Plymouth at 1.30am on Wednesday. Atutahi, one of four occupants in the car, died at Taranaki Base Hospital that afternoon.
It was just the beginning of Wednesday’s deaths. A person was killed in a crash at the southern entrance of Wellington’s Terrace Tunnel. The 7.50am crash shut the tunnel for hours and caused commuting chaos during rush hour.
A serious single-vehicle crash that afternoon, on SH35 south of Tolaga Bay, killed another.
The Tekapo-Twizel Rd crash followed, then another at Waimauku, West Auckland, in a two-car crash at 5.15pm. A 64-year-old woman died of her injuries yesterday as a result of the Waimauku crash.
On Thursday, a serious crash in Morrinsville killed one, and a motorcyclist died in a collision with a car in Eyrewell Forest, Waikmakairi that evening.
Yesterday brought two more road deaths and a total of 13 for the week. A pedestrian was hit in Bulls at 4.15am. At Whangaehu, south of Whanganui, a 23-year-old man died in a two vehicle crash at 12.30pm.
A total of 378 road deaths were recorded in 2017.