Tragic end to family holiday as teen dies in car crash :
Eastern Cape festive road death toll now 136
EXCITEMENT over a family holiday cruise turned to tragedy yesterday when Westering High School matriculant Kristen Porter was killed in a head-on collision near Mount Frere, between Mthatha and Durban.
Kristen, 18, and her mother, Cotswold Preparatory School principal Barbara Porter, father James and elder sister Samantha were travelling to Durban for a trip on board the cruise liner Symphonia.
After leaving Port Elizabeth, they slept in Mthatha on Thursday night. The accident took place early yesterday. It is not clear who was driving or what caused the accident.
Kristen would have received her matric results on Tuesday while on the cruise with her family.
“She was a once-in-a-lifetime type of girl that you do not often come across in your teaching career,” Westering High School principal Stuart Hayward said yesterday.
“Kristen was a brilliant academic and sportswoman, well-loved among her peers and friends. She achieved the highest award at our school, a Lantern Award, for excellent performance in sport and academics.”
More than 1 000 people have died so far on the country’s roads over the festive season, with the Eastern Cape reporting the thirdhighest death rate so far at 136 fatalities, after KwaZulu-Natal with 205 fatalities and Gauteng with 156 road deaths.
A family friend said Barbara Porter was still extremely shocked and needed some time before she could speak to the media.
The rest of the family were not seriously injured and received medical treatment in a hospital in East London. Samantha was treated for bruised ribs, she said.
Another close friend, Westering Primary School principal Dennis Gouveia, a former colleague, said the school was shocked by the news of Kristen’s death.
“Barbara was my colleague for more than 15 years at Westering Primary before she left for Cotswold Preparatory, and Kristen was one of our school’s top pupils. Even in primary school we knew Kristen to be an exceptional student, with a bright future.”
Hayward said Kristen was an all-rounder: a school prefect, in the girls’ cricket and hockey first teams, as well as one of the 15 top-performing academic students in her matric class.
She had also been in the school ensemble since Grade 8 and had received first prize in music since Grade 8. She was enrolled to study biokinetics at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University this year.
In Cotswold Extension, Moregrove Primary principal Pierre Potgieter expressed his condolences with the Porter family.
Education Department spokesman Mali Mtima said of Kristen: “She could have been a great leader.”