A logging truck’s trailer flipped on the Opaki Kaiparoro Rd on Thursday afternoon. PHOTO/KAREN COLTMAN
KAREN COLTMAN and EMILY IRELAND
A logging truck’s trailer flipped into a ditch on Opaki Kaiparoro Rd north of Masterton after a tyre burst just after 5pm on Thursday.
Driver Mark Thomas said the trailer’s front tyre burst.
“I had to hold on for my life and I am just grateful no other vehicles were on the road,” Thomas said.
He crossed the centre line with the truck coming to a stop on the wrong side of the road facing traffic. The back trailer was twisted on to its side into the ditch. About 15 logs were spread across the road with a pile landing in the verge.
Thomas has been driving trucks for 26 years and said he’d never had an accident. He said the road was very narrow for trucks.
A cyclist who had been passed by the truck and came upon the scene told the Times-Age it was only a matter of time before someone was killed due to trucks failing to stay on the road.
Within an hour of the crash three vehicles had come to help get the truck unhitched from the trailer and transfer the logs on to another vehicle.
“Thankfully, my mates are coming to help clean it up,” Thomas said. “I am just so upset as I have just paid for my children to go to college and am getting going in my business.”
Only a few minutes earlier, Wellington Free Ambulance and police attended a two-vehicle crash on Masterton-Castlepoint Rd between Te Kanuka Rd and Blairlogie-Langdale Rd. Three people were injured.
A WFA spokesperson said one person was treated for minor injuries at the scene, and two men, one in his 30s and another in his 70s, were taken to Wairarapa Hospital.
They were described as in a “moderate condition” on Thursday night.
