Police have named the five family members killed after the car they were in collided with a tree near Taupō this week.
Peter Rangikataua, 44, 15-year-old Michelle Morgan-Rangikataua, 14-year-old Aroha Morgan-Rangikataua, 12-year-old Kahukura Morgan-Rangikataua of Rotorua and 26-year-old Rangi Rangikataua of Atiamuri died in the crash on Monday.
Emergency services were called to the scene on Tirohanga Road, near Okama Road, at about 7.40am.
Taupō Area Road Policing Group Detective Sergeant Fane Troy told 1 NEWS six people had been travelling in the vehicle when it crashed.
One person, an 11-year-old boy, survived the crash and was airlifted to Waikato Hospital in a serious condition.
Detective Sergeant Troy said conditions were dry, adding that it was "too early to say what has caused the crash".
"What I can say is that not all the occupants in the vehicle were wearing their seatbelts," he said.
The deaths occurred on what was a horror morning on New Zealand roads, with three others having died in a separate crash near Ashburton and a ninth person having died hours after flipping his car into a lake near Auckland Airport.
It was the highest death toll in New Zealand for one day in more than a decade.
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