A Christchurch man came within millimetres of death when a 13cm rock smashed through his car windscreen, fracturing his skull and ricocheting around the car at terrifying speed.
The close call on a Christchurch back road happened only five days before 22-year-old Rutger Hale was killed by an unknown object which smashed through his windscreen near Wanaka on Thursday.
Both incidents happened on open roads early in the morning, with commercial vehicles travelling in the opposite direction at the time.
Jurgen Muller, 47, was driving his 12-year-old son Tim to a mountain bike relay at McLeans Island last Saturday when the incident happened on Pound Rd, near Christchurch Airport, about 8.10am.
He remembers seeing a truck and then a rock "bouncing along the road towards us".
"I had no time to react before the rock smashed through the windscreen, glancing the side of my head, hitting the headrest and then smashing through the side window."
The rock appears to have gone through the windshield directly in front of the Subaru's driver seat, so Mr Muller must have dodged to the side.
He then managed to pull over, where a group of people looked after him until an ambulance arrived.
A scan at Christchurch Hospital revealed a fracture to the side of his skull.
Doctors said he was lucky to have survived, but he was allowed to return home on Thursday and was expected to recover within four to six weeks.
His wife, Grace Muller, said the fatal incident near Wanaka had highlighted how incredibly lucky they were.
"Had it been millimetres more towards his head, then he would be dead."
Tim was in the front passenger seat, and neither of their other two children had been in the back, where the rock had ricocheted before smashing a rear side window.
"So we really are just unbelievably lucky."
They had kept the 13cm-long rock, which made a "clean hole" in the windscreen that was unlike anything the glazier who repaired it had seen before.
Mrs Muller said the rock had either fallen off the oncoming truck or was flicked up by it. It would have hit the windscreen at a speed of more than 80km/h to 100km/h, which both vehicles were believed to have been travelling at.
She did not know where the rock had come from, but they suspect it was from one of the local quarries in the area.
In the last few days, they had heard of two other incidents where stones had damaged, but not gone right through, windscreens in the same area.
Mrs Muller said they had reported the incident to police, but were told there was not enough evidence to make a case.
She would not drive in the area again until something was done.
"It seems like there's a problem, that this is happening to so many people that we know of, on that road."
