Bela-Bela SuperSpar crash story unfolds

New details from the car crash at Bela-Bela’s SuperSpar continued to emerge, with the driver of the runaway vehicle confirmed as a female person.

The police this week said the woman driver has not been charged, but investigations into a case of reckless and/or negligent driving continue.

The police also disclosed that Gerrie van der Westhuizen (64), who died during mop up operations in the aftermath of the crash, succumbed to a heart attack on the scene.

Bela-Bela police spokesperson, Sergeant Frans Maponya, has confirmed that an inquest docket has been opened with regards to the incident.

He said at the time of tragedy the man was assessing damage at the Tops Bottle Store.

The walkway adjacent to the bottle store was destroyed by the runaway Toyota Fortuner, which drove its way into concrete slab barriers, on the evening of Saturday 5 October.

Video footage from the scene of the crash shows the runaway vehicle

driving into smaller barriers protecting the entrance into SuperSpar.

The vehicle is also captured U-turning, picking up speed and smashing head-on into the huge pillars holding aloft the overhead shade along the bottle store’s side wall.

At the time Maponya confirmed that two other sedan vehicles were damaged at the scene of the crash.

— The BEAT