Chance meeting ends in death for two go-getters

Natalie Walker

One was an ambitious university student, the other an award-winning hairstylist.

The two young Matamata women had only just met, but shared a passion for socialising and meeting new people.

But the lives of Michelle Leeanne Fletcher, 21, and Natalie Kate Walker, 18, were cut short just after midnight on Sunday when their car and a truck collided head-on in the Kaimai Ranges.

The two, who met on Saturday when introduced by a mutual friend, are believed to have made a spur-of-the-moment decision to drive to Tauranga.

Ms Fletcher, a Waikato University student, had told her family she wanted to celebrate after finding out she had landed a job at the Auckland branch of accountancy firm Staples Rodway.

She planned to take up the position after completing her bachelor of business management degree at the end of this year.

Her mother, Jill, said she had applied for the job through the university and had come home with the contract in her hand. "She was really very happy," Mrs Fletcher said.

She said the youngest of her three children juggled her studies with part-time work at The Warehouse and a busy social life.

"She was an achiever. She had ambition. She liked lots of friends."

Ms Fletcher lived at home and her mother believed her decision to go to Tauranga was spur-of-the-moment as she had work on Sunday morning.

It was through a work friend that she met Ms Walker, a hairstylist at Outer Hair salon in Matamata who also liked meeting new people.

"She was a social butterfly. She hated being by herself," said her sister, Rychelle.

Ms Walker had recently won the under-22 section of the Wella Young Professional Stylist competition for the Waikato region, and planned to compete in the nationals in June. "We were all so proud of her," her sister said.

Ms Walker had begun studying hairdressing when she was 14 and had always wanted to make it a career.

"She loved it. She was doing all of our hair when she was 9," her sister said.

Rychelle, 21, said the loss of her vivacious, loyal only sibling had yet to sink in for her and her parents.

Ms Walker's funeral will be held at Matamata Memorial Centre at 11am on Thursday.

Ms Fletcher will be farewelled at All Saints Anglican Church, also in Matamata, at 1.30pm tomorrow.

The cause of the crash is still unknown, but police said preliminary investigations had shown that Ms Fletcher's Honda crossed the centre line on State Highway 29 and collided with the truck-and-trailer unit. The truck driver was uninjured.

St John Ambulance staff said driving conditions on the highway, the main route between Tauranga and the Waikato, had been poor because of rain.