Devastation after losing wife, mother in crash

Gwen Donhardt was a potent woman who would do anything for her family members and buddies.

Tragically, those who realized Margaret and her mother-in-law Gwen are now in mourning soon after the Strathalbyn women of all ages have been killed in a crash around their hometown on Friday.

Margaret, 70, was driving Gwen, eighty five, to Mount Barker for a doctor’s appointment when their motor vehicle and a Holden Commodore collided head-on on Extensive Valley Rd just soon after 2.30pm.

Margaret died at the scene whilst Gwen was flown to Flinders Professional medical Centre have been she passed away a limited time later.

The male driver of the Commodore – a forty three-year-previous Mount Barker male – sustained slight injuries in the smash.

Margaret’s partner, and Gwen’s son, Neville Donhardt has bravely compensated tribute to his spouse and mother.

The 64-year-previous, who said he read about the crash on the radio and right away had a bad emotion about it, was staying supported by buddies and family members on Saturday early morning as he fondly recalled how he and Margaret satisfied.

He said he 1st laid eyes on his spouse-to-be at a bash they both attended far more than thirty many years ago and assumed, “she appeared all right”.

And almost straight away, they grew to become inseparable, marrying at the Strathalbyn Lutheran Church in 1987.

The couple had two children with each other, Reece and Hayley.

Margaret also had two adopted children, Kelly and Jason, from a prior marriage.

Sadly, her 1st partner died in a motor vehicle incident a number of many years prior to Neville and Margaret satisfied.

Neville said his spouse, who had been a nurse prior to she started doing work in primary output, had endured a ton of hardship in her life and was “tougher than I am”.

“About 2000, she got her leg caught in a potato harvester … and so she had a prosthetic leg,” he said.

But this didn’t slow her down far too significantly.

Neville said Margaret liked to travel.

“We’ve performed about 3 or 4 cruises,” he said.

“The 1st just one was New Zealand … and then we went again about 3 many years later with an additional couple and we drove all over for a fortnight. She just appreciated holidaying.”

The pair lately had to cut limited a stop by to Western Australian simply because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Neville said he would skip Margaret terribly and was by now emotion lonely without having her.

Margaret’s youngest daughter Hayley, thirty, said her mum would be remembered for “how potent a woman she was”.

“She’s been as a result of all the things and yet was still so identified and arrived out on major of all the things,” she said.

“She did all the things for us, took us to all our athletics that we preferred to do and all the things like that.”

Margaret also liked staying a “nan” to her eight grandchildren – Seth, Isaac, Nicholas, Lachlan, Tom, Marley, Makaira and Jade.

“Our young children adored her,” Hayley said. “They often preferred to (stop by) simply because I think she was a little bit of a sucker for supplying into them.”

Neville said his mother Gwen would “do anything for you”.

He said she had been a driving instructor in Adelaide, Mount Barker and Murray Bridge for far more than forty many years, only lately retiring.

“She appreciated undertaking her driving,” Neville said.

“She’s acknowledged from the young children that she taught and they’ve developed up and they’ve got young children and she taught them as perfectly.”

Neville said Gwen’s partner – his father – died a very little far more than 12 months ago.

“They have been just tough Mallee men and women,” he said.

Law enforcement are investigating the situation encompassing Friday’s crash.

Extensive Valley Rd is infamous for deadly crashes.

In January 2019, a 46-year-previous Mount Barker woman was killed in a head-on crash on the thoroughfare.

Significantly less than 3 months earlier, high faculty sweethearts Hayden Perkins, seventeen, and Mikayla Eastwood, 18, died soon after the motor vehicle they have been in and an additional vehicle collided on the identical stretch of road.

The driver of the other motor vehicle was a teacher at Eastern Fleurieu College, wherever the couple had just concluded Yr 12.

Truck driver Malcolm Russell, 52, of Strathalbyn, is a family members pal of the Donhardts and said Extensive Valley Rd was plagued by inattentive, impatient and dashing motorists.

“I get men and women overtaking on the … double white line, on the crests of hills, when automobiles are coming the other way,” he said.

“(There was a) motorbike riding … along the white strains in in between a motor vehicle heading up the hill and a truck coming down the hill at six o’clock in the early morning at warp pace.”

Mr Russell said the road should be upgraded to make it safer.

“Along those sections wherever there’s merging, wherever there’s the double white line in the middle, have the cable part heading up there so it stops men and women from heading on to the improper side of the road on a crest and on a bend,” he said.

“More patrolling by law enforcement (is also essential) but not in a law enforcement motor vehicle.

“If they did it in each day previous Mitsubishis, Holden Commodores, Falcons, that blend into the targeted visitors, everyone has got to go ‘is that a cop motor vehicle or isn’t it a cop motor vehicle?’.”

There have been 64 lives lost on South Australian roadways this year, as opposed with 75 at the identical time last year.

Two women of all ages have died in a head-on crash on a infamous stretch of road around Strathalbyn.