A truck driver burnt to death while trapped in his vehicle, which had veered out of control down the Town Hill stretch of the N3, outside Pietermaritzburg, on Saturday afternoon.
A female passenger escaped almost certain death when she was pulled from the vehicle by an off-duty nurse, said Road Traffic Inspectorate spokesperson Colin Govender. He said that the driver had attempted to manoeuvre the truck over an arrester bed, but had been unable to do so.
The truck had hurtled down the hill out of control, left the freeway and burst into flames.
The Pietermaritzburg Fire Department said that the driver had been trapped in the cab of the refrigerated truck, which had already caught alight, when firemen had arrived at the scene.
Although the vehicle had been lying about 20m off the road, firemen said that the blaze had been so intense that they had felt the heat from the safety of the freeway.
There were no other casualties in the accident.