HIGHWAY ROLLOVER DRAMA

Woman airlifted to hospital
after 90-minute rescue effort

IT took rescue workers an hour and a half to free a badly injured NSW caravanner from the mangled wreckage of a near-new LandCruiser after a horrifying rollover in Queensland.

The 41-year-old Wollongong woman was trapped in an almost fetal position behind the steering wheel of the Tasmanian-registered 4WD, which ended up on its roof in bush at the side of the Bruce Highway.

One tow truck worker told Caravanning News the woman's NSW-registered 18ft caravan had "exploded into a thousand pieces" on a notorious stretch of highway north of Gin Gin.

The woman was flown 350km to Brisbane by an AGL Action Rescue helicopter while her two female passengers, aged 43 and 15, were taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital with minor injuries.

She suffered serious pelvic and spinal injuries in addition to a laceration to her head and spent two days in Royal Brisbane Hospital's intensive care unit.

Other caravanners stopped to help the trapped woman but there was little they could do until emergency workers with special equipment arrived at the scene just south of the Lake Monduran turn-off.

The LandCruiser's twisted remains

Police cleared a stretch of highway to enable the mercy chopper with an emergency paramedic on board to land.

Bundaberg-based AGL Action Rescue pilot Richard Snell told Caravanning News: "Our paramedic administered pain relieving drugs and helped extricate the injured woman who had been trapped in an almost fetal position. It took about 90 minutes to cut her free."

He said the woman's injuries were considered to be severe enough to fly her to Brisbane rather than the nearer Bundaberg Base Hospital.

Witnesses said the rig was travelling north when it began swaying on a downhill stretch of highway.

"It got to the stage where the caravan was at right angles to the car and the whole thing just rolled," one said.

Police said Forensic Crash Unit and Scenes of Crime officers both attended the scene, with the highway's north and south lanes being closed for several hours.

Meanwhile, two caravanners were taken to hospital when their rig was sideswiped on the Pacific Highway, south of Woolgoolga in NSW.

Police said a northbound Mitsubishi Magna, driven by a man in his 60s, veered onto the wrong side of the road and smashed into a caravan being towed by a Nissan Pathfinder.

The force of the impact caused the Jayco Heritage caravan to flip, tearing it in half.

The driver of the Magna was trapped in the wreckage and had been freed by emergency services crews.