Man, 91 dies after crash
Residents including off-duty fire fighters gathered to help a 91-yearold man after the fatal collision between his mobility scooter and a car, north of Wellington.
The man died in Palmerston North Hospital on Tuesday night after the collision on Waerenga Rd in Otaki on the Kapiti Coast.
It appeared the man had been getting fish and chips.
‘‘His fish and chips were still in there, perfectly in the paper bag,’’ Joseph Te Wiata, who came to the man’s aid, said yesterday.
Sharon Bznez was in the lounge of her home nearby when she heard the sound of the impact, which she said was like a ball being thrown at a window.
Then she saw people running out from the neighbouring Body and Soul Fitness gym towards the scene.
They started directing traffic, and gathered around the man lying on the road, at the western end of the street, near Aotaki St.
In a wheelchair herself, Bznez could see no more, nor head across to help.
It was 4.30pm when two gym members who had just left ran back through the doors and told Te Wiata, the manager, to call an ambulance.
‘‘When I got out there, there was just him, lying on the road,’’ Te Wiata said.
The woman in the car involved in the collision was ‘‘beside herself’’, he said, sobbing and calling for people to call 111.
More gym members came out to help, and they set about comforting the man who was bleeding, but conscious. He asked to be turned over, but Te Wiata said they kept him still.
‘‘We said ‘we can’t move you because of possible injuries we can’t see’.’’
They put a sheepskin mat under his head, and a jacket over him to keep him warm as shock set in.
‘‘Then we had a couple of guys from the volunteer fire brigade turn up – they were just going past, so they came and helped as well.’’
He said after the man was taken away by ambulance, Te Wiata was asked to store his mobility scooter at the gym.
Te Wiata said he did not find out until yesterday morning that the man, who he had often seen driving on his scooter, had died in hospital.
‘‘The next time I saw him I was going to say ‘hello, I was here when you had your accident’, but I’m never going to get that chance.’’
The man’s family has been informed of his death, police said.
The Serious Crash Unit is investigating.