Tongan band play for members killed in bus crash as holiday road toll rises to 11

The Mailefihi Siu'ilikutapu College Brass Band perform in Gisborne, just days after the fatal bus crash. Photo / Paul Rickard

The Tongan brass brand which lost two members in a Christmas Eve bus crash performed a tribute concert tonight as the holiday road toll climbed to 11 with a week to go.

Mailefihi Siu'ilikutapu College Brass Band played for the first time since the Gisborne crash at the House of Breakthrough Church, in memory of 11-year-old Sione Taumalolo and Talita Moimoi Fifita, 33, who died in the accident.

Forty-four others were injured when the bus crashed down a 100-metre bank.

Gisborne bus crash victims Sione Taumalolo and Talita Moimoi. Photo / Facebook

Gisborne local Kristina Williams said approximately 400 people attended the concert, to raise money for the families of the deceased and the school.

"It was special and moving. The passion that these people have is amazing. I've never experienced anything like it."

The band members, who Williams said were aged between about 11 and 17, played with the few instruments they could salvage from the bus, which was recovered from the site on Wairoa Rd by a heavy-lift crane today.

"More than half of the instruments were completely damaged."

Williams said some of the group members had cuts on their faces and bandages.

"You could tell they had been through the wars."

The bus, which crashed in Gisborne on Christmas Eve killing two, was recovered today. Photo / Supplied

The double fatality was included in the holiday road toll which reached 11 after a man was killed when a car and milk tanker collided in Hawera, South Taranaki today.

Last year's holiday road toll was 12. At only halfway through the holiday period the country has almost exceeded that toll. There is still a week left before the period ends on January 4.

Williams has set up a Givealittle page to help raise funds for the group that had been due to perform at a church service on Christmas Day.

Donations made by the Gisborne and wider Tongan and New Zealand communities have raised more than $35,000 on the page by tonight.

"It's just humbling,'' Williams said.

Air New Zealand is flying the band members from Gisborne to Auckland for free tomorrow, so they can catch a connecting flight to Tonga.

Eight of the injured remain in hospital and there is concern for one, who has been in the intensive care unit in Waikato Hospital.

Two men, one in his early-30s and an 18-year-old, who have remained in Hawke's Bay Hospital since the incident, have thanked those who helped save their lives.

"Thanks to God who let us live, the emergency services at the crash and the Lowe Corporation Rescue Helicopter which brought us here to hospital.

"We want to thank them for their help. We are getting better each day. Our brother (18-year-old) has lost his leg, as a result of the crash, but is recovering well, thanks to the doctors. His parents are excited he's alive, and the best thing for them is he's going to be okay.

"We are looking forward to seeing our people from the bus crash when we are discharged from hospital, but we are doing okay."

Tributes at the site of the Christmas Eve bus crash. Photo / The Gisborne Herald

Police have been interviewing witnesses and the bus driver.

"The police serious crash unit is conducting an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the crash and, while this is ongoing, we are unable to speculate on the cause of the crash," said Tairawhiti area police commander Inspector Sam Aberahama.

"The investigation will include a full mechanical inspection of the bus, along with an assessment of road conditions and any other possible contributing factors."

Tyler Te Ruru Ahurei Davis died on Boxing day after she was hit by a car in a Te Kauwhata driveway. Photo / Givealittle

The community is also rallying behind the family of the little girl who was run over in a driveway in Te Kauwhata on Boxing Day.

A Givealittle page was created for "beautiful, cheeky little girl" Tyler Te Ruru Ahurei Davis, 2, to raise money for funeral costs.

The page said the incident had "shaken the family and community to the core".

Flowers and tributes at the scene of a crash that killed three teenagers near Leeston in Canterbury on Boxing Day. Photo / Kurt Bayer.

Meanwhile, the funerals of two of the teenagers killed in a horror smash in the early hours of Boxing Day will be held in Christchurch in the coming days.

Cole Troy Hull, Samuel James Drost and Lily Frances Moore, all 15-year-olds from Canterbury, died when a car they were in, being driven at high speed by a 14-year-old boy, crashed near Leeston.

Incidents on the roads continued today with two people taken to Waikato Hospital with serious injuries after two cars collided at the intersection of State Highways 5 and 28.

Two people were taken to hospital with serious injuries after a collision at a busy south Waikato intersection. Photo / Supplied

Also, a truck carrying nearly 200 LPG gas cylinders rolled in Waimauku, northwest of Auckland, causing nearby homes to be evacuated as a precaution.

The official holiday road period began at 4pm on December 23, and runs until 6am on January 4. Last year's Christmas road toll was 12, from 244 reported injury crashes.

Holiday road crash victims:
• A man died in hospital today, after the car he was driving collided with a milk tanker in Hawera.
• A motorcyclist died in a crash at Pukerau, near Gore on December 27.
• Three teens - Cole Troy Hull, Samuel James Drost and Lily Frances Moore - were killed in a crash near Leeston, early Monday. The car was being driven at high speed by an unlicensed 14-year-old boy, when it became airborne then smashed into a macrocarpa hedge, narrowly missing a concrete power pole.
• Another motorcyclist died at the scene after a collision with a car on Napier Rd in Ashhurst, Manawatu, on Boxing Day.
• Tyler Te Ruru Ahurei Davis, 2, was run over in a driveway in Te Kauwhata on Boxing Day. The toddler died on a public driveway, which meant the death is included in the official road toll.
• Lower Hutt man Clifford Irving, 66, was killed in a collision between a motorcycle and a ute on State Highway 2 in South Wairarapa on Christmas Day.
• A double fatality on Christmas Eve claimed the lives of Sione Taumalolo, 11, and Talita Moimoi, 33, when the bus they were in crashed down a 100m bank in Gisborne.
• The first fatality of the holiday period was Myung Wha Lim, 83, who died after being hit by a car in Takapuna on December 23.