Через 60 лет после трагедии на дороге в Реревакаиту двое выживших в автокатастрофе 1966 года воссоединились

Survivors of an August 1966 Rerewhakaaitu crash Brian White (left) and Ian Agnew (centre) with Doug Green, who was the first on the scene. Photo / Megan Wilson Today marks 60 years since a crash on an unsealed rural road killed two young rugby players. Megan Wilson speaks to two survivors – reconnected after three decades apart – and the first man on the scene about the tragedy and years that followed. Doug Green still thinks about the“ifs and buts” of the crash that killed two rugby teammates after a game in 1966. On August 14 of that year – a Sunday – a car carrying four young rugby players was in a head-on collision in the lakeside dairy farming village of Rerewhakaaitu, south of Rotorua. Two of the teenagers in the car died, and two survived. Green, a fellow rugby player, said he was travelling behind the group. He did not see the collision, but was the first on the scene. He recalled checking on those involved and emergency services arriving quickly. “It’s a bloody shame actually, but life’s like that, you know? There’s always ifs and buts … if they’d have finished the game earlier, gone home at 3pm like they should have done … “But the game went on, didn’t it, and everybody just got in the car, let’s get the hell out of here.” The four teammates and friends, Ian Agnew, Brian White, Anthony Witton and Graham Norris, had been driving to Reporoa. Witton and Norris, both aged 18 and from Reporoa, died. Witton, described in a newspaper report as a farmhand, died in the accident. Norris was initially admitted to Rotorua Hospital. White, 18, from Ngakuru and Agnew, 15, survived. They lost touch about 30 years ago but reconnected this year thanks to social media. White, 78,said he recalled the group finished playing rugby in Rerewhakaaitu about 3.30pm on the day of the crash. “We all had to go back to milk cows. “The roads were not metalled at that time.” Travelling around a left-hand bend, their car crashed into an oncoming vehicle. “I ended out over the left-hand side of the vehicle in the paddock. “I remember getting up and then I looked at the car, the next thing, I just blanked out.” White spent three weeks in Rotorua Hospital. “I ripped my nose, chin, my left arm and just had facial injuries.” He made a full recovery. “I was always pretty upset about the whole thing because I was the only one that ended up walking …” Ian Agnew, 75, has used a wheelchair since the accident. He said he did not remember a lot from the crash, but his son, Ben Agnew, helped fill in the gaps. Speaking from Ian’s home, Ben said that in 1966 his father had just started a farming cadetship on a Reporoa dairy farm. He met the other rugby players through a young farmers’ group. On the day of the crash, the four were driving in a Volkswagen Beetle. Ian was in the back seat. The engine was in the back and came “flying” out in the collision, hitting Ian in the back of the head, Ben said. He was taken to Rotorua Hospital and spent three-and-a-half months in a coma, “curled up in the foetus position”, Ben said. “They couldn’t get my legs down,” Ian said. “They thought I was going to die.” Ben said his father then spent two-and-a-half years in Rotorua Hospital doing physiotherapy and rehabilitation. Ian had “constant” operations on his feet and hips until 1978. “His feet collapsed … it was all in aid of trying to get him to sit in a chair, get him out of the foetal position,” Ben said. Ian said he was in a wheelchair because his hips had “seized up”. “I’ve got no hips now.” But Ian’s disability did not stop him from working, playing sport or being a husband and father, Ben said. Ian ran a pool room business in Rotorua before working for the local council as a gardener for 12 years, “trimming hedges, raking leaves”, Ian said. Ben said his father participated in disabled sport in the 1970s and 1980s — shot put, javelin and discus. He had also enjoyed fishing at Ōhope’s accessible wharf. Nowadays, he enjoys “cruising around into town” when the weather is nice. Ian has carers to help him at home. In the earlier days, his family were his main support. Ben said his father’s resilience and survival for six decades was inspiring. “To see how fiercely independent he’s been … just knowing that everything is hard. “Everything’s a challenge … but you still do it with good humour,” Ben said. Ben, who has a younger sister, said his father has two grandsons and a granddaughter. Survivors reconnect after 30 years White, who lives in Levin, said he retired this year after driving buses for 35 years between North Island cities. He lost touch with Ian Agnew about 30 years ago. The pair reconnected this year after Ben Agnew tracked White down on Facebook. “It’s hard for me because I hate seeing him like that … ”, White said. White and Agnew were happy to reconnect. “They talk on the phone bloody near every day, you buggers now, don’t you?” Ben said. Megan Wilson is a health and general news reporter for the Bay of Plenty Times and the Rotorua Daily Post. She has been a journalist since 2021.