Auckland motorway wrong-way driver: One critically hurt as car going wrong direction crashes

A car travelled the wrong way down the Squadron Drive on-ramp and collided with a car towing a boat and other cars on Upper Harbour Mwy in Greenhithe. Photo / Hayden Woodward

The driver of a car going the wrong way on to an Auckland motorway has been critically injured after hitting a ute towing a boat.

Three others were also moderately hurt in yesterday’s 8.15pm incident when the car drove the wrong direction on the Squadron Drive on-ramp on Upper Harbour Motorway in Greenhithe, police said.

The critically injured driver was taken to hospital, St John paramedics said.

The road was then closed as police serious crash investigators examined the scene.

“Enquiries into the circumstances of the crash are under way,” police said.

A car travelled the wrong way down the Squadron Drive on-ramp and collided with a car towing a boat and other cars on Upper Harbour Mwy in Greenhithe. Photo / Hayden Woodward

A photo earlier posted on social media shows a boat, which is being towed, on an angle in the middle of the motorway with traffic backing up behind it near the Squadron Drive on-ramp.

A Fire and Emergency NZ spokesman said fire teams were also called to the two-car crash.

A Herald photographer at the scene said two vehicles appeared to have collided head-on.

Hundreds of vehicles are backed up city-bound, with vehicles being turned around to the nearest off-ramp. Police’s Serious Crash Unit is in attendance.

The crash was between a blue SUV and a ute towing a boat. Photo / Hayden Woodward

The crash was between a blue SUV and a ute towing a boat. The SUV, which has had both front doors removed, was facing the wrong way.