A dangerous passing incident on the Kaimai Range, State Highway 29, last month has resulted in a truck driver being charged.
Commercial Vehicle Safety Team National Manager Inspector Scott Webb said following an investigation, Police have charged a 40-year-old Tauranga man with dangerous driving.
The incident occurred on SH29 on January 7 and was filmed on a dashcam.
The footage shows a truck on the wrong side of the road at a passing lane.
Dashcam footage of the truck overtaking on the wrong side of the road was posted online. It is not clear from the 29-second video, posted anonymously on social media on January 7, why the truck entered the oncoming lane.
The caption of the post said it happened on the Kaimai Range, and a timestamp on the video suggested it was filmed that afternoon.
The video shows the vehicle with the dashcam vehicle driving in the far-left lane as cars pass it in a passing lane.
Across the double yellow lines are two oncoming lanes.
With the passing lane running out, a white car overtakes the filming vehicle and the truck uses the oncoming lane to overtake both vehicles.
The truck re-enters the left lane in front of both vehicles as the passing lane ends, and an oncoming vehicle rounds the corner ahead.
He has been summonsed to appear in the Tauranga District Court on February 27.
"As the case is before the court, we are unable to comment further," Inspector Webb said.
3 comments
Safe to pass?
Posted on 06-02-2025 00:46 | By ConcernedCit
Although very disturbing for oncoming traffic. Without explanation for why the driver chose this maneuver it may be presumptive to think he was acting recklessly. I know that section well and if I can hazard a guess, the passing truck has gathered speed approaching the passing lane occupied by the filming truck -the white car driver did not allow the truck behind to pass them both, instead blocks the lane at a slower pace meaning the following truck is forced to heavily brake or choose to pass on the unoccupied side of road. That stretch of road and the opportunity to pass there, is a hazard of downhill speed and a short passing distance before merging again. I would fault the car driver for not allowing room for the truck to pass as much as the truck driver.
M.Mouse
Posted on 06-02-2025 07:09 | By M. Mouse
I wonder on which fair he won his drivers license for a 30 ton rig what boulders down a hill.
With a action like that you clearly don't understand what would have happened if you would have parked your truck in to upcoming traffic !
You think that you own the road by poor driving behaviour.
All of your licenses should be taken of you with no return and you should be using public transport or a push bike.
You also should apologies to your employer who is paying your weekly wages so you can have fun in your time off whit that I mean smoking meth and drink lots of alcohol because In all fairness you could not have been sober !
You should also apologies to your colleagues because of your piss poor driving behaviour
You are discrace to all road users
Truck driver
Posted on 06-02-2025 12:34 | By Colleen S. Johnson
The truck driver either doesn't know or care about the road code. Should lose his license and look for another line of work which doesn't involve endangering others, but we all know that will never happen
Leave a Comment
You must be logged in to make a comment.