Lucky escape for teens

Hawke's Bay emergency services work on a young man who drove his car off the Te Mata Peak. Photo / Hawke's Bay Today

Four teenagers had a miracle escape after a car they were travelling in plunged 150m off the towering Te Mata Peak in the Hawkes Bay.

A 16-year-old passenger suffered a broken leg but three others walked away from the crash with cuts and bruises.

Witnesses said the car spun out of control while going 60km/h around a dangerous corner.

It flew off the western side of the cliff at 1.30pm on Friday afternoon.

Phillip Otter, a passenger in a following car, said: "As we were leaving to come down the hill these four kids came screaming past us and lost control of their car and they went over a bank.

"Then they rolled over about four times and went airborne and they hit the bottom, bounced and kept rolling."

Otter, who had been sightseeing with his girlfriend and parents, was expecting to find bodies when he clambered down to the wreckage.

"We just thought 'there's no way in hell they could have survived that'," he added.

"And then by the time I got half-way down the hill I saw them walking around yelling and screaming."

Otter, a bread truck driver, said the boys were behaving like "hoons". The 17-year-old driver, his 15-year-old brother and another 19-year-old passenger managed to walk back to the road unaided.

Ambulance officers treated the injured teenager at the scene before taking him back up the hill on a stretcher.

All four were taken to Hawke's Bay Hospital.

Sergeant Clint Adamson said the 17-year-old held a restricted licence and should not have been driving with passengers. "It is likely the driver will be facing charges," he said.

The green Daewoo saloon car was registered to the brothers' father.

He was said to be out of town when informed of the crash.

Otter said the teenagers had been "clowning around" in the car park at the top of Te Mata Peak, throwing a road marker off the side.

- additional reporting Hawke's Bay Today