Cow dives off truck to its death

A cow took a suicidal leap off the back of a cattle truck directly in the path of an oncoming vehicle on State Highway 2 near Gisborne yesterday.

Two people in a utility vehicle travelling north near Ormond were not hurt after they hit the cow, that had suddenly jumped from the back of a south-bound cattle truck, landing in front of the ute. The cow was killed.

Senior Sergeant Maui Aben said the driver had no option but to run over top of the cow.

"They were towing a trailer and the ute was thrown to the left of the road but fortunately they were able to correct themselves and get back onto the road," he said

Mr Aben described it as a freakish accident and said he had never heard of anything like it before.

"You see them jumping off each other in the back of a truck, but never onto the road. All the stars had to be aligning themselves in order for it to jump off directly as the car was driving past the truck," he said.

A woman travelling behind the ute said the cow had literally just appeared on the road out of nowhere.

The driver of the ute was travelling at about 95kmh at the time and he and his wife were obviously left shaken, Mr Aben said.

The truck was properly secured and there was nothing that could have been done to avoid the accident.

"They did everything right. It was just one of those freakish incidents that you don't see every day."

- NZPA