Watch: Car goes over ditch trying to outrun police

A Tauranga businessman has captured surreal footage of a car smashing through a wooden fence and flipping into a ditch in a failed bid to escape police.

Prime Painting and Decorating director Callum Lee was driving home from Whakatāne, where he had been for a job for the new business, when he rounded a corner and came across a "small line of traffic" piled up behind road spikes.

A policewoman was in the middle of the road waving at the traffic to stop, he said.

Thinking "something is about to go down", Lee pulled out his phone and began to record.

An oncoming car weaved across the road heading straight for the queued traffic as it tried to outrun a red police highway patrol car that was running its sirens.

"My initial thought was if he goes straight ahead and hits the spike stripe he could hit any one of us," Lee said.

As the car tried to swerve to avoid the spikes, a truck and ute pulled out in front of it blocking the escape route.

The truck was damaged during what Lee called a bit of a "heroic" effort from the driver.

"He did well all the same."

Lee said the officers initially drew their Tasers as they advanced on the car, which had fallen down a cattle underpass, but then heard groans coming from the car.

Groans were not the only audible sound in the aftermath of the crash.

"You could hear the ticking in the video of the electric fence."

He said he could not see the condition of the driver after the crash and was quickly waved on by police.

A police spokeswoman said police initiated a pursuit on the afternoon of September 27 due to a vehicle failing to stop.

"Police had attempted to stop it due to the manner of driving (appears the driver may have gone through a stop sign and was driving erratically)," she said.

"The driver went through Matatā, and the car eventually ended up in a ditch on the side of the road. Police spoke with the driver back at Whakatāne station and the car was towed."

A 38-year-old male was due to appear in the Tauranga District Court on Thursday on driving charges.