Discovery of body in a ditch lifts holiday road toll to 21

The official holiday road toll rose to 21 yesterday after the body of an Auckland motorcyclist was found near Cromwell, days after he crashed.

Personal items found at the scene identified the man as Fenton William Tisdall, 29, an Air Force engineer based at Whenuapai, but Cromwell police Sergeant Steve Ereckson said formal identification had yet to be made.

It appeared the man was travelling south on State Highway 6 from Wanaka when he lost control and landed in a drainage ditch 250m from the Cromwell-Wanaka-Queenstown intersection, Mr Ereckson said.

"We don't know when the accident occurred, but he was found by a member of the public - a local weatherman who located the motorbike and body near the weather station." The motorcyclist had been there for "a few days".

The drainage ditch was 30m from the road and the body would not have been visible to people travelling in vehicles or hitchhiking, he said.

"Even the vineyard workers wouldn't have seen it."

The high holiday road toll - almost double that of last Christmas and New Year when 11 people died - has disappointed officials and road groups.

Land Transport New Zealand media manager Andy Knackstedt said people in "holiday-mode" let their guard down.

"The toll is one of the highest," he said.

The 21 deaths were from 19 crashes and compared with an average of 18 deaths over the past five Christmas-New Year holiday breaks.

The deaths included eight car and van passengers, seven car and van drivers, four motorcyclists and two pedestrians.

Eighteen of the 21 deaths were on the open road. Ten deaths were in single-vehicle crashes in which a driver lost control or ran off the road. Three crashes were head-on collisions and three were at intersections. Of the 15 killed in vehicles at least three victims were not wearing seatbelts.

Provisional reports showed the common factors were travelling too fast for conditions (four deaths), failing to give way or stop (three), pedestrian factors (three), alcohol (two) and fatigue (two).

Mr Knackstedt said too much should not be read into the toll, as the overall trend was down.

"It's always a bit of a danger to look at a small period over a holiday period and read too much into that," he said. "In the long term we are heading in the right direction. The road toll for last year was the lowest in more than 40 years."

Provisional figures for 2005 were 405 deaths, compared with 1963 when 394 deaths were recorded.

The toll was still far off the stated goal of no more than 300 deaths a year, Mr Knackstedt said.

"There's a lot of work for us to do."

- OTAGO DAILY TIMES, NZPA