Similar accidents

29-year-old followed his sister to her death

Two years ago, a 25-year-old woman died in this car wreck, and now her brother (29) has died in the same way.

(Bild: Matthias Lauber/laumat.at)

It's really creepy how a brother and sister lost their lives barely two years apart. Sister and brother died in almost identical ways in almost the same place. And the circumstances as to why the 29-year-old crashed his car into a truck in Upper Austria on Ash Wednesday will probably remain unknown forever.

How much suffering can a family endure? Less than two years after a 25-year-old woman from Niederneukirchen died in a serious car accident in her home town, her brother (29) has now also died in a road traffic accident.

Firefighters knew the victims
The accidents are so similar that they send a shiver down the spine of even outsiders. A look back to July 14, 2023: Back then, the emergency services were called to a serious accident. Near the Avia petrol station in Niederneukirchen, a small red car and a low-loader collided head-on. The 25-year-old female driver was fatally injured in the accident. Many of the firefighters called to the scene knew the young woman and had gone to school with her.

Another red car, another truck
Then again on Ash Wednesday: very close to the scene of the accident where the 25-year-old died in her small red car, it was another small red car that drove into the wrong lane on the L 564, Wolferner Straße, between St. Florian and Niederneukirchen and crashed head-on into a truck. It wasn't an overtaking maneuver or speeding - why the Hyundai i20 took the wrong lane on a dead straight road at around 6 a.m. remains a mystery.

Helpers withdrawn as a precaution
The two vehicles came to a standstill in the ditch, the truck driver got out himself, but: "It was clear relatively quickly that the operation was a roadkill rescue. The emergency doctor was already there and had confirmed the death of the driver," says fire department operations manager Martin Pree from the St. Florian near Linz fire department.

When it became clear that the driver (29) was from Niederneukirchen, the fire department's helpers were withdrawn. The shock was great when it became known that this was not the first accident drama to shake the victim's family.