KEY POINTS:
It was another bloody weekend on the country's roads, with seven people killed.
The toll includes talented motocross rider Leith McConochie, 25, whose car left the road and ended up in the Buller River in the early hours of Saturday.
He was driving on State Highway 6 near Murchison with his girlfriend when the car left the road and plunged down a 30m bluff.
The woman made it to safety and alerted emergency services.
The car was located in five metres of water but searchers have yet to find Mr McConochie's body.
It is managed to free himself from the submerged car but was carried down river by fast-flowing currents and disappeared.
Sniffer dogs could be used today to search the riverbanks for his body.
The McConochie family has owned Lake Station in St Arnaud for several generations.
Mr McConochie was a talented motorcycle rider who had finished third in a round of the South Island cross-country motocross championships in March.
In other accidents, two people died when two car collided on Waikato's State Highway 27, near Tirau, yesterday afternoon.
A third person was taken to hospital with serious injuries.
Further south, at Tokoroa, a man was killed when a car crashed into a power pole on Old Taupo Rd on Saturday night.
The 21-year-old driver of the car died and it appeared excessive speed was a factor, police said.
A passenger in the vehicle was taken to Tokoroa Hospital with moderate injuries.
Overnight on Friday, a 34-year-old man died when his vehicle rolled down a 10-metre bank on Great Barrier Island. His body was discovered at about 7am on Saturday.
In a similar incident north of Wairoa, a 17-year-old man died when the car he was driving rolled down a bank at Frasertown, north of the town early on Saturday.
Police said the vehicle skidded on grass before rolling about 15m down the bank.
A passenger was able to make his way up to the road to raise the alarm.
About 2am on Saturday, 37-year-old Hastings man Paul Allan Bennett died when the car he was driving went off Pakowhai Rd and crashed into a tree.
He was the only person in the car and police were still trying to establish why the car left the road.
Meanwhile, top New Zealand snowboarder Mitchell Brown was admitted to Dunedin Hospital's intensive care unit after a late-night motorcycle crash in Wanaka at the weekend.
Brown lost control of his motorbike on Totara Tce in the early hours of Saturday morning, police said.
He suffered facial injuries, broke his clavicle bone, fractured ribs and has suspected internal injuries after he collided with a powerpole.
Brown was flown by helicopter to Dunedin Hospital where he was admitted to the intensive care unit because of the internal injuries.
- NZPA
