ROGER MORONEY
Two metres of Napier hillside was all that stood between life and certain death for the driver of a car which crashed off Goldsmith Terrace yesterday morning.
The car had rolled and landed on its roof after the elderly male driver lost control on the tight, winding road.
Emergency services arrived
at the scene about 10.09am after a resident in Battery Road reported seeing a car on its roof.
The trapped driver was also heard sounding the horn. Police and ambulance officers were left shaking their heads in amazement, and relief, that the car had been halted by heavy undergrowth on a small plateau about 10 metres below the road.
Had it rolled once more it would have tumbled more than 60 metres down a sheer cliff face and on to Battery Road. St John Ambulance officers, firefighters and police worked to secure the car using ropes and assisted the injured driver out.
It took about 40 minutes to get the injured man out. He received a back injury and was taken to Hawke's Bay Hospital.
The man's name and condition were not available. As the job of dragging the car back up onto the road got under way just after noon, police evacuated three residents from two houses below and closed Battery Road for about 15 minutes.
The car was recovered without incident.
