Wrong-way driver shock: Family travels for 3km on wrong side of Auckland road

A family is lucky to be alive after driving for at least 3km on the wrong side of a normally busy road south of Auckland - while a witness frantically tried to get them to stop.

Two videos posted to Facebook show the Filipino family's silver hatchback dangerously cresting hills and rounding blind corners on the wrong side of Great South Rd heading south from Ramarama to Bombay just before 11.30am on Sunday.

Bombay local Adam Reeves, who took the videos, said he followed the car for about 3km until he managed to stop the Filipino driver, who was travelling with his partner and a child.

"Even before I started videoing, I tried to get him to pull over. He just kept looking at me, I couldn't get him to stop," he said.

"It was quite worrying. I use that road every day. It's quite a busy road, it's very surprising that no one was coming round those bends. I knew my father was coming the other way soon.

"It was just alarming that I couldn't get him to pull over beforehand, I didn't know how to stop him."

Reeves said the man seemed to have thought that the road was a two-lane, one-way road.

"If there's a sign on both sides saying the speed, they see it as one-way," he said.

"He was in shock in the end, I think. I actually felt quite sorry for him. He was probably doing about 70km/h. He was driving well in his lane, he stayed within the lane. I just don't know how long he was driving in that lane before I saw him."

Reeves said others told him on social media that the Filipino driver had been in New Zealand for more than two years and was a production worker in Auckland.

He said similar cases had also been reported in Facebook groups.

"Generally people are saying it's quite common and it's quite alarming," he said.

"People are seeing it more and more now."

Reeves said it was lucky that the old Caltex petrol station at Bombay was closed due to a recent change to Z, because it was usually busy with trucks coming and going.

Other locals on the Bombay Grapevine Facebook page thanked Reeves for stopping the man.

"Got my heart pumping so glad a car didn't come driving down the road specially round those corners," one Facebook user wrote.

"That was right past my house," another user wrote.

"That roundabout is so busy and that bend he came through over the hill, very lucky no one was coming the other way. Send your video into the police Adam."

Another Facebook user on the Motorway Community page where the video was also posted wrote: "wtf lucky this clown didn't kill someone".

Police said they were making inquiries into the video.