Tackle the toll: Family’s grief after fatal crash gets worse every day

THE hurt of losing 22-year-old Jaiden Cottingham gets worse every day, her family says.

Jaiden Cottingham’s mum Sam and sister Meghan want defensive driving course and road trauma education to be mandatory for young drivers. Picture: Tony Gough

• Road deaths are never acceptable
• Horror road toll after teen dies in M2 smash
• Road toll: We’re on track for 300 deaths

THE hurt of losing 22-year-old Jaiden Cottingham gets worse every day, her family says.

The bubbly beauty therapist was killed when the car she was driving crashed near Swan Hill.

Her sister Meghan Cottingham, 20, described August 26 — the day Jaiden died — as “the worst day of my life”.

“You feel it every day; it gets worse every day,” she said.

On the day Jaiden died, Meghan was at her Strathfieldsaye home, near Bendigo, waiting for the pizza delivery driver to return with the garlic bread he had forgotten. The doorknock came about 7pm.

“I came back out and it was the police walking in, and they asked who was home, and dad said it was just us two,” Meghan said.

“They said there was an accident in Swan Hill, it was a fatality, there was only one person in the car and it was Jaiden.

“That was heartbreaking. I didn’t really believe it at first; I was like ‘no, you’re wrong, I spoke to Jaiden just this morning, you’ve got the wrong person. I called her like eight times and she didn’t answer, then I fell apart.”

Jaiden Cottingham was killed in a car crash near Swan Hill.

Mum Sam Cottingham said she was speaking out in the hope that every young person would complete a mandatory defensive driving course and road trauma education before being eligible for their licence.

Meghan described her sister as her best friend, and someone with sheer determination.

Three days after finishing her course at Elly Lukas Beauty Therapy College, Jaiden landed her dream job in Hamilton Island, in Queensland.

“She was always doing my eyebrows, my makeup, and even tried to convince dad his eyebrows needed to be done,” Meghan said.

“Whenever we were together, we would just hang out.”

The pair say the their lives have been much “quieter” since Jaiden died in August.

Like most other 20-somethings, Jaiden would constantly be sending text messages, posting photos to Instagram or sending SnapChats — pictures through a messaging app — to her siblings and friends.

The silence now is deafening.

“It’s not until months later where it gets to the stage where you have a second of silence to breathe and think about what’s happened and the fact that she isn’t going to come home,” Sam said. “She’s not going to walk through the front door and say, ‘hey, family, I’m home,’ which is what she did all the time.”

Jaiden’s local community has set up the Jaiden Cottingham Memorial Fund to raise money for Headspace in Swan Hill.

Victorian road toll soaring

ALEKS DEVIC

A PERSON dies or is seriously injured every two hours on Victorian roads.

Speed continues to be the leading cause of road deaths and drug drivers are an increasing concern.

Road toll: Source TAC

The soaring figure of lives lost this year is also being linked to motorcycle deaths with 48 killed — almost double compared to same time last year.

Country roads are causing grief to families with 137 deaths this year compared to 134 on metro roads.

Victoria Police Assistant Commissioner Doug Fryer said country roads were over- represented in road trauma.

“The reality is, country roads are more dangerous than city roads,” he said.

There have been 272 lives lost so far this year compared to 241 at the time last year.

This year’s road deaths continue to escalate and 300 people are expected to die by the end of the year — the last time the toll was that high was 2009.

The road toll has increased for the third year running and authorities are pleading for motorists to change their behaviour to save lives.

VicRoads chief executive officer John Merritt said better roads, safer cars, slower speeds and safety barriers along country highways would go a long way to saving lives.

TAC chief executive officer Joe Calafiore said getting the road toll to less than 200 by 2020 was achievable.

“If you would have said in 1970 that in 2010 the road toll would have been 300, that would have been equivalent to saying the earth is flat — it would have been considered lunacy.”