The driver of a horror car crash which killed five teens on Saturday night was found conscious lying in the wreckage, telling a member of the public who stopped at the chaotic scene, "How did I survive?"
The 19-year-old driver, on a restricted licence, was still inside the front half of a Nissan Bluebird which had been sliced in half after a high-speed collision with a concrete power pole on a country road just outside Timaru about 7.30pm.
Five of his friends, including one later found by police in the boot of the car, died in the crash. They were Javarney Wayne Drummond, 15, Andrew George Goodger, 15, Niko William Hill, 15, Joseff Alan James McCarthy, 16, and Jack Graeme Wallace, 16, all of Timaru.
Melissa Bryce, a 34-year-old single mother of three, was driving from her home nearby into Timaru for a night out with friends as a sober driver when she came across the carnage on Seadown Rd.
"He was able to tell me that, yes, he had been in an accident and then kept saying, 'How did I survive?'.
"I just kept talking to him, asking his name, his age, where did he work, what were the plans for tonight, and everything like that. Just making sure he made contact with me, to keep him awake."
She asked if he was in pain. He replied that his side was hurting and she made sure he stayed still.
"This is a situation you never want to come across but you just do what you need to at the time," she said.
She was wary that the car, which was still running, could have caught fire.
She feels for the driver, who "has a long road ahead of him", and hopes that she can see him again.
"I know it would probably do him some good," she said. "I do sympathise with everyone involved in it, even the driver, because I know he did not mean to make a mistake like that.
"I could tell he had remorse in his voice when he was talking to me, you could hear it.
"I do believe that he did make a stupid mistake."
Bryce has good support around her and finds talking about her experiences is helping her deal with what she saw.
"I am proud of how I acted, which was the way that I think you should in a situation like that. You have to be calm because everyone else around you is not."