A senior public servant who died in a car crash near Cardrona in 2022 lost control on a "greasy" road before colliding with another vehicle, a coroner says.
In her findings released today, coroner Mary-Anne Borrowdale said Emily Stewart-Harding, 43, was killed instantly in the collision on the Crown Range Road on November 29, 2022.
Originally from the West Coast, Ms Stewart-Harding lived with her partner in Wanaka, where she worked remotely as a senior policy analyst for the Ministry of Education.
On the day of the crash, she left her home about 2.30pm to drive to Queenstown for an appointment.
Evidence from the drivers of two vehicles following Ms Stewart-Harding gave conflicting evidence about her speed.
A driver who followed her for about 15 minutes said she was driving neither slowly nor fast.
However, the second driver behind her said she was travelling slowly, and he had considered overtaking.
About 3.15pm, Ms Stewart-Harding lost control of her 2004 Subaru station wagon as she exited an uphill, left-hand bend about 10km south of Cardrona.
The vehicle slid across the road, rotating sideways, into the path of a BMW station wagon.
The driver of the BMW, who had no time to take evasive action, was not seriously injured despite extensive damage to his car.
Ms Stewart-Harding’s car was "substantially deformed" by the impact, and she was "grievously injured".
Despite the efforts of other motorists to assist her, including two doctors, she quickly died.
Ms Borrowdale said a pathology report found the injuries to Ms Stewart-Harding’s brain would have been "instantaneously lethal".
Her car had only front airbags, and neither had deployed because of the side impact.
Although the reasons for her loss of control were unclear, drizzle had wet the road, and one driver described the conditions as "greasy".
A police Serious Crash unit investigation pointed to a "mishandling in wet conditions", she said.
"This is as much as we can confidently say about the causes of this tragedy."
