Kemps Creek crash: Little girl killed in horror head-on collision remembered as ‘a princess’
THE little girl killed in a horror collision at Kemps Creek in Sydney’s west yesterday has been identified as two-year-old Anelina Janet Matagia Nauer. Her uncle has remembered her as “a princess”.
NSW
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THE uncle of the two-year-old girl killed in the Kemps Creek head-on crash said his niece was a “princess”.
Anelina Janet Matagia Nauer was killed when the mini-van she and her family were travelling in collided head-on with another van on Tuesday.
Anelina’s mother Kristen suffered two broken legs, her grandfather Antonio is in a coma and her brothers, aged nine months and three, are in hospital in stable conditions.
“My little niece Princess Anelina R.i. P I love you very much,” he wrote. “God Bless the Nauer Family — love you all,” her uncle Sio Nauer posted on Facebook.
A disqualified learner was driving a minibus carrying eight other members of her family when it collided head-on with a van.
Witnesses have told police they saw the minibus cross to the wrong side of the road before the crash.
The Nauer family had been singing and laughing less than 12 hours earlier, in a video posted on social media by Anelina’s mother Kristen, as they drove from Griffith to Sydney Airport to fly to Samoa for a Christmas holiday.
The 20-year-old relative behind the wheel is in hospital suffering from abrasions and is yet to speak to police.
Family members were left mourning the loss of little Anelina, with her cousin Marilyn telling reporters she was “adorable”.
“She’s everything to her dad. Not only her dad, but her grandpa. She’s like the most spoiled one in the family. Obviously she’s the only girl,” she said.
One of the girl’s aunts posted: “I’m lost for words, I can’t handle it all in a week RIP my dearest niece Fly high beautiful you will forever be in our hearts.”
The toddler’s uncle Sio Nauer wrote that he was at work when he was told there had been a crash involving a family “of about nine people” near where he lived.
When he got home he got a call from his nephews in New Zealand who told him about the accident and only then did he realise how close to his home the crash actually happened.
“It so sad to me because someone told me and I never knew it happened to my family,” he wrote.
A local resident used a hammer to smash open windows to help free the children.
Crash Investigation Unit Chief Inspector Phillip Brooks said they were investigating numerous possible contributing factors, including whether the young children in the minibus were restrained in child safety seats.
“It certainly is a critical factor where a young child has died. This issue does reflect the need to make sure that our children, our greatest assets, are properly restrained in proper child restraints when they’re inside our cars,” he said.
He said the crash had left the family traumatised.
“It is very sad and tragic … it is evident this family have driven some distance,” Chief Inspector Brooks said.
Kristen posted a video hours before the crash of the family singing and laughing on the way from Griffith to Sydney Airport to go to Samoa.
Mr Nauer wrote that he was at work when he was told by the owner of the property he was working on that there had been a crash involving a family “of about nine people” killing a little girl at Moorebank where Mr Nauer lived.
Mr Nauer said a Go Fund Me page has been set up with the aim of raising $10,000.
“Any donations would be kindly appreciated for this beautiful family,” the page’s founder Puaga Ioelu wrote.
“Recently involved in a horrific car accident, losing a baby girl and with several in critical condition, donations are going towards providing this family with food, clothes, services of any kind, assistance for medical bills and of course a contribution towards a send off for their beautiful baby girl Anelina Matagia Nauer.”