Fatal crash leaves SH1 in ‘absolute madness’

One person died and another four were injured in a crash on State Highway 1, north of Auckland yesterday.

The crash, which happened near Cowan Bay Rd south of Warkworth, closed part of SH1 between Puhoi and Warkworth, leading to extensive traffic delays on a busy Friday afternoon.

One resident said the traffic was the worst he’d seen in the eight years he had lived in the area.

Grant McLoughlin described the scene as “absolute madness”.

St John was called at about 1.30pm. Initial reports said four people suffered moderate injuries and one had critical or lifethreatening injuries.

Police later said the critically injured person had died.

One of the people listed initially as moderately injured was last night in a serious condition.

Drivers were diverted off SH1 to Makarau and SH16. By 6pm it was taking about 50 minutes to get from Puhoi to Warkworth.

After that, another two crashes occurred within half an hour.

At 4.40pm, one car crashed on SH16 just south of Wellsford, injuring one person.

Shortly before 5pm, a campervan smashed into a fence on Woodcock Rd between Old Kaipara Rd and Edgerley Rd. No one was injured but a police spokeswoman said they received complaints of traffic delays.

McLoughlin said he was hearing of other crashes as traffic built up.

“It’s impatience, distraction. It’s not speed, it’s just simple bad driving habits, because they have tried to put safety requirements in and lower the speed limit into Warkworth and it just comes down to people being distracted and staring at their phones and when they see a queue they just want to overtake that one driver.”

People stuck in traffic took to Facebook, one saying the stretch of road was “so dangerous with impatient drivers”.

Another said: “It’s gridlock in all directions . . . Flat Rd is the end of the queue going north via SH16.”

AA principal adviser advocate Martin Glynn said a roading project between Puhoi and Warkworth would ease the pressure on SH1 and this crash highlighted why it was so important.

“A crash like this is tragic, the road has to be closed because police need time to investigate, but it just shows why we need more reliance. The network should be able to cope so one crash doesn’t shut things down like we have seen today.”