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One person died after a tree fell on State Highway 1 north of Dunedin today.
A police spokeswoman said officers were called to the scene, on the north side of Kilmog, south of Waikouaiti, at 12:10 p.m.
A tree had reportedly fallen and struck two vehicles, he said.
A ODT The photographer at the scene said that the tree had fallen at the foot of the Kilmog and that there was a car upside down in a ditch.
Stuff reports that the deceased was in this vehicle, that he was not one of the two impacted by the tree.
A spokesperson for St John confirmed that two people had moderate injuries.
Later, the police confirmed that a person had died and said that the death had occurred after an accident.
There was a bulldozer at the site that had removed pieces of the tree from the road.
A witness told Stuff that his own vehicle narrowly avoided hitting the tree, and another vehicle was nearly crushed. It had branches under the wheel.
The police Serious Accident Unit was on the scene and the road was expected to be closed while they examined the scene, police said.
Motorists are cautioned that there are temporary speed restrictions in the surrounding area.
A spokeswoman for the New Zealand Transport Agency said it carried out the logging, under traffic management, earlier this week at a separate site about 100 meters before where the accident occurred.
The two sites were not related, he said.
Temporary traffic management will remain in place overnight until an assessment of other nearby trees can be completed tomorrow morning.
