Speeding campervan spins out in snow

Monday, 20 May 2024

• A campervan was clocked by police doing 109kph

• As the driver pulled over the campervan spun out of control

• It is the second incident of a speeding campervan recently on the same stretch of road

A campervan driver spun-out in the snow after he was pulled over by police for speeding.

The incident took place on State Highway 8 near Omarama on Sunday, when Senior Constable Dan Bartlett, of Oamaru, clocked a campervan speeding at 109kph.

The driver of the six-berth campervan, which has a company-imposed maximum speed of 90kph, nearly crashed when pulled over by police.

“The police officer has tried to pull him over due to his speed, but as he has pulled him over his wheels have hooked the ditch and he has done a big pirouette,” Senior Sergeant Karl Hemmingsen, Otago Coastal area road policing manager, said.

It was a concern that the driver, who was issued with an infringement notice, was not driving to the conditions, and comes after another motorist was clocked speeding at 137kph on Saturday, leading to a $400 infringement notice.

It was the second incident of a speeding campervan caught by police on the same stretch of highway in recent weeks.

Last week Stuff reported that the driver of a campervan that sped past a police vehicle at 139kph was ordered off the road by the campervan company.

The tourist driver, who is also from Hong Kong, was clocked driving the large Maui campervan on SH8, near Omarama on Thursday.

He was issued with a $400 infringement notice and 50 demerit points, but narrowly escaped having his licence stripped for 28 days.

A spokesperson for Tourism Holdings Limited (THL), which operates the Maui brand, told Stuff the driver was “no longer on the road”.

The company took road safety “very seriously”, and that included helping to familiarise international tourists with the country’s driving laws “to ensure they, and other road users are safe”.

It provided pre-travel advice, and got motorists to complete a questionnaire after familiarising themselves with the country’s driving rules, the spokesperson said.

Before embarking on their trips, drivers signed a document confirming the speed limit was 90kph.

At Easter on the same state highway, four people - including two Malaysians students studying at the University of Canterbury - died following a crash between two vehicles and a motorcycle.

Police regularly nabbed speeding drivers, particularly tourists, as they travelled between the likes of Aoraki and Queenstown, along the stretch of SH8 between the Lindis Pass and Twizel.

In September Stuff reported on a campervan that was spotted crossing the centreline multiple times on the narrow road between Aramoana and Port Chalmers, near Dunedin.

The footage was captured by a following motorist, and led to police obtaining the vehicle’s registration details.

In that case the vehicle had been returned to Christchurch Airport.