Speeding drivers blamed for horror weekend toll

"Arrogant" drivers with a disregard for speed limits have contributed to a horror weekend on the nation's roads, police say.

Ten people have died since Friday afternoon, and National Road Policing Manager Superintendent Dave Cliff is accusing some drivers of having a "cavalier attitude" to speed limits.

He said people public needed to look at their attitude to such carnage.

"Often they're referred as accidents. Very, very few are. Most occur because drivers make bad decisions or choose to break the law," Mr Cliff told National Radio.

"I guess what we need to do is start not viewing them as an act of God, as something that just happens. They happen because people often choose to drive in these ways."

Poor weather in many parts of the country was believed to have contributed to some of the crashes but could not be blamed for them all, Mr Cliff said.

"...the biggest killer out there on our roads remains travelling over the speed limit or too fast for conditions," he said.

"I think that people too easily forget that the human body is extremely fragile and when...impact speeds get much over 30km/h, the chances of the human body being able to survive those speeds and survive drops off dramatically."

Modern cars made people feel safe and insulated but they had to remember the body was still "extraordinarily fragile", Mr Cliff said.

However, the news was not all bad; despite the horror weekend, 68 fewer people had died compared with a year earlier.

"But I think...for the loved ones of those 10 people killed, it's probably very cold comfort," he said.

The carnage started with the death of 10-year-old Brittany Davis, who was hit by a truck after getting off her school bus near Clevedon, South Auckland, on Friday.

The 3.30pm crash was witnessed by children on the bus, and happened as her mother waited at the gate.

Police had this morning released only one other name of those killed in crashes, that of Tautatao Taiti, 46, of Oamaru, who died when the car she was driving crossed the centre line and collided with a light truck travelling south about 11pm Friday near Palmerston, 57km north-east of Dunedin.

In other crashes:

* A motorcyclist died after colliding with a parked car at 8pm on Friday on State Highway 12 near Paparoa, in Northland.

* A 46-year-old truck driver died after their truck rolled in the Waioeka Gorge on State Highway 2, about 17km, from Opotiki, at 8.30pm on Friday from Opotiki.

* Two people died in a head-on collision between a car and a truck on State Highway 1, south of Foxton, on Saturday.

* Three people in the same car and believed to be from the same family died at the scene when they collided with another car at about 2pm yesterday on the Napier to Taupo Highway. The crash happened at Te Pohue, 45km north-east of Napier, in rain so heavy a rescue helicopter could not fly to the site but had to wait for one of the injured -- thought to be a boy aged about 12 -- to be transferred to the base before flying him to hospital.

* A 19-year-old woman died when her car crashed at Aokautere, near Ashhurst, 15km north-east of Palmerston North, about 2pm yesterday. The car was found upside down and submerged in a drain.

Mr Cliffe said said there was a long way to go to get road toll down to Government target of fewer than 300 deaths a year.

- NZPA