Vietnamese Man, Lam Xuan Hu, Dies From Truck Wheel Injuries

Today we heard that the Vietnamese man struck by a loose truck wheel yesterday has died after his life support machine was turned off. Later reports named him as  Lam Xuan Hu, a 24-year-old living in Manukau on a student visa.


News reports said that the he was a passenger on a bus that was hit by one of two large wheels that came flying off a passing truck. The incident happened yesterday in rush hour traffic on the motorway between Otahuhu and Mount Wellington, Auckland.

One of the wheels crashed through the front screen of the bus, rolled down the aisle, rebounded and hit Lam Xuan Hu. Our deepest condolences go out to his family and friends for their sad loss.

We'll leave aside for one moment the issue that yet another foreign national had met an untimely end on New Zealands roads. We'll focus on the point that this incident was one of many in New Zealand recently that have involved trucks.

German cyclist Mia Pusch, the mother and child in Hastings, the two Spanish tourists, the 7 killed on a holiday weekend, the woman in her 60s south of Napier, the Swedish tourists in Northland, German cyclist Stephan Stoermer, Des Eyre, police superintendent Steve Fitzgerald, and many others all met their end in a truck 'accident'.

Some reports say that the truck was recently serviced and that specialist reports into the vehicle's condition had started. We wonder if road-worthiness was a factor in any of the other crashes and if it is time for a review of truck servicing and maintenance and time to tighten-up Certificate of Fitness checks.


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