Police are hoping a road speed guide passed before Christmas will help turn around an alarming rising trend in the road toll.

EXCLUSIVE: Family members recall how Leotisia Malakai - the third victim of a horrific bus crash near Gisborne - slipped into a coma and never woke up.

A Waikato man says he can still hear a mother's "blood-curdling screams" as she arrived to the scene of a horrific crash which left her children fighting for their lives.

Both the holiday road toll and last year's entire toll are the worst they've been in years.

The road toll is now at 18 after a fatal crash in Whakatane.

Five people were lucky to escape from a serious crash in the Lewis Pass without life threatening injuries, due to wearing seatbelts.

Two people are being flown to hospital after a Southland car crash.

Police have issued an arrest warrant for Jamie Lesley Jones in connection with an alleged hit and run that left a cyclist in a critical

The man killed in a motorcycle crash near Gore on Tuesday was convicted of raping and killing a South Otago woman in 1993.

Holiday road toll is at 14 after a person was killed in a single-car crash in Northland, as police in Hawke's Bay appeal for witnesses to a hit and run.

Emergency crews are being kept busy after a series of crashes in Auckland and Wellington this afternoon.

A truck was blocking State Highway 1, north of Wellington, after it rolled.

A Norwegian tourist has penned a piece saying NZ roads are too dangerous and the speed limit should be changed on narrow and winding roads.

Boxing Day crash victim remembered as one of the "most amazing people" .

A man reportedly tried to take the keys off a group of teens in the lead-up to a Boxing Day crash which killed three 15-year-olds in Canterbury.

Disappointed police boss says all the fatal crashes over the holidays were avoidable.

Road toll now equal to last summer's following death of motorcyclist.

A person is seriously injured after an early morning crash in Mt Maunganui.

Watch: Five months after a crash in which he and his best mate were seriously injured, James Rolleston still struggles to do simple things.

The funeral arrangements of two of the teenagers killed in a horror smash in the early hours of Boxing Day have been released.

One person has died and another two been badly injured in separate crashes as holiday traffic queues across the North Island.

Fund will help the people injured in Gisborne bus crash.

Morgan Tait talks to emergency staff about crashes in which people are injured and sometimes killed.

Motorists are being urged to "play their part" to prevent further road carnage after a grim start to the Christmas holidays that has already left 10 dead.

Family and friends of the three teens killed in a horror smash have been visiting the crash site in Canterbury all day today.

A car filled with adults and children has flipped on SH4 north of Whanganui.

Plans to recover a bus that plunged down a bank, killing two, have been delayed until tomorrow.

The annual road toll has exceeded last year's grim total with four days before the period ends

Significant delays remain on State Highway 1 north of Wellsford after this morning's truck crash.

Tonga's deputy prime minister is focused on getting the schoolchildren involved in a Christmas Eve bus tragedy in New Zealand home.