Car collides with cow on highway

Animal Control was called and the injured cow was put down. Photo / APN

The driver of a car which struck a cow on State Highway 1 escaped without injury.

Police were alerted to the collision at Te Kao about 9.40pm on Monday.

The driver was not injured and, while the car was badly damaged, it could still be driven. The injured cow got up and walked off and was put in a nearby paddock by a local resident. Animal Control was called and the creature was put down.

It was one of four crashes reported to police over Queen's Birthday weekend.

The other non-injury crashes were on Monday at 9.48am, when a handbrake was left off and a vehicle rolled into a house in Ranger Place.

No one was injured when two cars collided in 2nd Ave in Whangarei about 10.16am on Sunday. Neither was anyone hurt when two cars crashed in Maxwell Place, Whangarei.

Northland's top police officer Inspector Murray Hodson said the fatality free weekend meant there had been no fatal vehicle crashes over Waitangi, Easter, Queen's Birthday weekend and Labour weekend over the past three years in Northland.

There had been 72 calls to *555 received from drivers in Northland and 38 were responded to by police staff over the holiday period.