Crash survivor sad at waste of life in triple fatality

Ian Anderson has a broken sternum . Photo / Supplied

When Ian Anderson rounded a motorway bend on a drizzly night and saw a car spin across the road, he he knew it wasn't going to end well.

"You know you're doing 100 [km/h] and it isn't slowing down very much. You sort of think you'll get the windscreen or steering wheel in the guts or something," he said.

The 51-year-old motorcycle wrecker from Rotorua was driving home on Tuesday night, after dropping a mate at Auckland Airport, when his Ford Courier ute and a Ford Probe collided near the Pink Pig cafe on SH2 at Maramarua.

Police believe the Probe driver, Mary Jane Kingi-Te Purei of Gisborne, lost control on the 85km/h bend and the car spun into the path of Mr Anderson's eastbound ute.

Medical staff told Mr Anderson he was lucky to walk away with a broken sternum from the T-bone crash that killed Ms Kingi-Te Purei, her cousin Te Maungarongo Te Kuiri Kingi and their friend Tiata Maxwell, all 18.

Mr Anderson, a father of two, will be housebound in Rotorua for the next six weeks, under the care of his son from Dunedin.

"I'll be buying a Lotto ticket, I think," Mr Anderson said last night, after being discharged from Middlemore Hospital.

He said he was saddened by the "waste of life" and bore no ill-will to the teenagers despite learning their car had been stopped doing 130km/h west of Gisborne earlier that day.

Western Waikato area commander Inspector Paul Carpenter said a traffic ticket was found in the Ford Probe showing Ms Kingi-Te Purei had been driving in breach of her graduated licence by carrying unauthorised passengers.

"Under current legislation police can only issue an infringement notice, not seize the vehicle. Tragically, the trio's trip to South Auckland came to an abrupt end in the Waikato on Tuesday night."

Mr Carpenter said it was too early to say whether drugs or alcohol were involved, but police had concerns about the state of the Probe's tyres.

SH2 between Pokeno and the turnoff to Thames is dubbed the "unforgiving highway" - 31 people have died and 56 have been badly hurt in the past seven years.

The families of the three teenagers are preparing to bury them this weekend, having driven through the night to bring their bodies home.

Ms Maxwell's mother, Averline Maxwell, said it was every parent's worst nightmare.

"When you get a knock on the door and a police lady is there saying your daughter's name ... You just can't comprehend it," she told the Gisborne Herald.

It is a double loss for Skella Campbell, grandmother of Ms Kingi-Te Purei and aunt of Mr Te Kuiri Kingi.

"I was in disbelief. Now it is slowly sinking in. They arrived home about 1.30am today and that was when it clicked - it seemed real," she said yesterday.

"It's overwhelming for this to have happened. But when I saw their faces, I felt a weight lifted. There was a peace. Whether you like it or not, it's them."

- additional reporting: NZPA