Crash family's new heartbreak

Emily Samuels was killed in a car crash in Brisbane on Saturday but her family can't afford to return her body to New Zealand. Photo / Supplied

An Auckland family mourning the death of a young mother of four in Queensland are facing further heartbreak - the likelihood that they won't be able to bring her home.

Emily Samuels' whanau have been struggling to pull together the $9000 that is needed to bring back the "bubbly" 26-year-old who died after a car crash shortly before midnight on Saturday.

A police forensic unit is trying to find out how the car Ms Samuels was driving left a road in the Logan City suburb of Eagleby. The vehicle ploughed through two fences before coming to a halt inside a residential carport.

Two teenage girl passengers survived the crash.

Yesterday, Ms Samuels' aunt and family spokeswoman Elaine Winter said arrangements to hold her niece's body in state for three days in her home suburb of Mangere had been put on hold as the family scrambled to come up with the cash.

But they have only until today to tell funeral directors whether they will be able to pay for her flight home.

"We are trying to do everything we can do and put it out there to the rest of the family that we need financial assistance," she said.

"But at this time of the year, nobody is in a financial position to come up with the money."

Ms Samuels' body stayed in Eagleby with family last night and Ms Winter said funeral directors due at the house this morning needed to know whether she would be kept in the country.

"They need to start making the preparations for the flight and we've pretty much told everyone that if it's not possible to come up with the money, we are just going to have to leave her there."

Ms Samuels' mother, Susan Opai, had not been able to see her daughter until Tuesday - two days after she arrived in the country, she said.

The rest of the family had been left "devastated" after being phoned with the news early on Sunday morning.

The tragedy came three months after Ms Samuels gave birth to her fourth child, Cassius, in August.

Her other children - daughter Portia, 3, and sons Sentorri, 4, and Tipene, 6 - had begun asking where their mother was, Ms Winter said.

A "south-side girl and very proud of it", Ms Samuels left Mangere for Queensland shortly after finishing high school.

She switched jobs "like the weather" while raising her children, before settling down as a full-time caregiver, Ms Winter said.

"She was a very bubbly person, full of life, and was always cracking a joke and sharing the love with everybody.

"You could definitely say her kids were very well taken care of.

"She was an amazing mother and the kids were always her first priority.

"I think we'll always remember her as a loving, pure, honest person who would do anything for anybody at the drop of a hat, that was our Emily."

Ms Winter said the family would keep trying to meet the costs until the last minute - and would even look to the community if they had to.

* A Kiwi teenager killed with two mates in a crash in Queensland will be farewelled today.

The ute Jareth Parris, 17, was travelling in struck a tree on a rural road near Cannonvale, north of Mackay, on Saturday. Grandfather Graeme McCready told the Herald how Jareth's height, 6ft 8in (2.03m), and size 17 shoes earned him the nickname "the gentle giant".