SOME of the residents of Maitland Vale had become so accustomed to the late night crashes they began carrying chains in their utes all the time, ready to haul out car wrecks.
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So when a Range Rover four-wheel drive carrying five mates hit what is known to some as the Maitland Vale Road S-bend, the end result was horrifying but predictable.
Driving the car was a 26-year-old red P-plater in control of a relative’s car, and whose Facebook page boasted photographs of flash cars.
In the front passenger seat was Rory Sayce, 22, while three other mates were in the back seat.
It is understood they had been to a regular get-together at a Lower Hunter hotel and were on their way back to Singleton.
But the car failed to make it through the S-bend at 11.15pm on Wednesday, instead careering out of control and ploughing into a gum tree roof-first as it began to roll over its passenger side.
Rory, a popular lad from Mount Olive near the banks of Lake St Clair, not far from Singleton, was killed instantly.
One of the backseat passengers, also 22, was hurled out of the car on impact but somehow survived with a broken collar bone and extensive bruising.
His two other backseat companions, aged 18 and 19, escaped with minor injuries and were discharged from hospital on Thursday.
The driver remained trapped for more than two hours, paramedics and rescuers working to free him as he was forced to sit there with his dead mate lying next to him.
He suffered a broken leg and other suspected fractures and was flown by Hunter Westpac rescue helicopter to John Hunter Hospital, where he remained on Thursday night.
‘‘All I can really say at the moment is Rory was an innocent passenger, he did nothing wrong,’’ a heartbroken father told the Newcastle Herald on Thursday.
The driver would have undergone the mandatory blood and urine testing once he arrived at hospital.
Hunter crash investigation unit experts are investigating any possibly causes of the crash.
But resident Tony Heitmeyer was one local who said the slow corners had trapped more motorists and motorcycles over the years.
‘‘Authorities would have to concede that the corner is deceiving,’’ Mr Heitmeyer said.
Mr Heitmeyer said his letter box had been ‘‘taken out’’ up to six times before a guard rail was put into place to stop vehicles careering down an embankment, a place where he would haul the cars out using his own vehicle and chain.
‘‘People approach the corner at a certain speed and it is only after they enter it that they realise it is sharper than they thought,’’ he said.
‘‘We are all concerned that the shape of the corner is the issue, all the locals know it.’’