KEY POINTS:
A 41-year-old woman has walked away almost unscathed after her car plunged 60m off the Karamea Bluff, north of Westport.
Julia Osselton's car rolled two or three times, landing on its roof between two trees. The roof was crushed down to the head rests and she found herself sitting on the windscreen.
Mrs Osselton, 41, a full-time MBA student from Christchurch, was on a five day camping holiday to Karamea.
She was heading home at 10.20pm on Wednesday night.
"I braked for a hairpin bend and it was raining," she said. "I skidded and instead of going around the bend I went flying off the side. There were no barriers."
"I undid my belt. The music was still playing and the headlights on but I couldn't get the keys out. I tried to look for my coat and torch but they had been thrown from the car.
"I just kept saying to myself, 'I've got to get out, I've got to get out'. I could smell the petrol and was worried it might explode. I knew I had to climb the bank, get to the road and get some help."
Using branches and shrubs for leverage she hauled herself back to the road.
Her only injuries were a small nick to her forehead and bruises on an arm and leg. Realising she was closer to Granity than Karamea, she walked downhill.
"I'd heard three cars pass by when I was climbing up, but I was too late and missed them."
It was half an hour before another vehicle drove by.
Buller Electricity faultsmen Allan Sara and Gene Reardon were returning home from a fault call-out in Karamea when they saw her beside the road.
They drove back to the crash site.
"When we looked over the edge it was near to vertical -- the car was upside down in some trees about 60m down," said Mr Sara.
"She'd uprooted about four large trees on the way. I couldn't believe she'd actually scrambled up. We had to use ropes to get down there. She's a very courageous lady."
The couple put Mrs Osselton up for the night.
Her husband Mike Osselton drove to Westport to collect her yesterday.
"I am relieved I still have a wife and the children still have a mother," he said.
- NZPA
