Crash victims ignore seatbelts

Police are shocked that many of the eight people killed on the roads this weekend were not wearing seatbelts.

Many of the fatalities were around the lower North Island, where emergency services from Kapiti, Lower Hutt and Masterton dealt with crashes.

In one crash yesterday, Masterton police spent most of the day at an early morning double fatality in which a car smashed into a wooden barrier on Black Swamp Bridge near Tinui.

The local couple who died were believed to have been heading to a friend's house. Their vehicle was found upside down and partially submerged in Whareama River.

Inspector Dave Parsons of the Office of the Police Commissioner said it "beggared belief" that five of the dead from the weekend toll - in crashes near Wainuiomata, Hamilton, Alexandra and Paraparaumu - had not been wearing seatbelts.

"Certainly the enforcement has increased, and the publicity has. And we still have risks, I just don't know what the answer is."

New Zealand went into the weekend with the August toll standing at 31, compared with 28 for the same month last year. But the crashes ballooned the monthly figure to 39 and the year-to-date statistic to 309.

Mr Parsons, whose office provides national road policy support, said the average weekend had 3.3 road deaths.

Other deaths apart from the Wairarapa couple, were:

Phillip John Gorrie, 17, of Paraparaumu, who died when his Mazda 323 and a Mitsubishi Pajero collided on State Highway 1, near Paraparaumu, at midnight on Friday. The driver and passenger of the Pajero were treated at Wellington Hospital and discharged.

Mark Fergus Hall, 45, and his son Brendon Eugene Hall, 17, both of Wainuiomata, were killed when their Mitsubishi V3000 went off the road on Wainuiomata Hill near Wellington and smashed into a bank at 5.20pm on Saturday. A female passenger was taken to Hutt Hospital in a moderate condition.

A 44-year-old man from Taupiri, Waikato, was killed when the van he was driving failed to take a sharp bend north of Hamilton about 9pm on Saturday. The van crashed through a roadside barrier and flipped into a paddock.

Rachel Lorna Slade, 17, of Roxburgh died after lying trapped in a Ford Falcon car when it rolled into a ditch 2km from Alexandra. Three 19-year-old Balclutha men and another 17-year-old Roxburgh girl were also in the car. One of the men has been charged with drunk-driving.

* A man was killed while riding his motorbike just north of Auckland last night.

The man, in his late 30s, collided with a car on the corner of Old Railway Rd and Coatesville-Riverhead highway at 6.30pm.

No one from the car was injured, ambulance staff said.

- NZPA

Herald Feature: Cutting the road toll