A 1.8m-tall, 100kg Ashburton man says he is more disappointed than angry that the driver of a truck that knocked him into a ditch on State Highway 1 near Oamaru on Saturday did not stop.
Export logger Mathew Arrowsmith (31), who suffered a broken right shoulder blade in the incident, said he was "blown away" the driver "didn't take responsibility" and could not believe the driver did not know he had struck something.
"I am not a small person. I'm pretty hard to miss."
Mr Arrowsmith said the incident happened between 1.30pm and 2pm.
During a trip south to Dunedin for work he had stopped his car between Pukeuri and Waitaki Bridge and crossed the road to relieve himself.
Standing beside the road, preparing to cross back over, he was struck by what he believes was a northbound white 6-tonne Isuzu flat deck truck.
Mr Arrowsmith said he noticed the truck coming and realised at the last minute that he was going to get hit.
He could not remember the impact, but thought it was possible it could have been the truck's wing mirror.
The impact sent him into a ditch and he believed he may have been knocked out briefly.
When he scrambled out to return to his car it was about 10m away from the place where he had crossed initially.
The pain increased as he drove to Dunedin and by the time he attended Dunedin Hospital's emergency department about 4pm the pain made it difficult to walk, he said.
His wife, Anna, who is pregnant with the couple's third child, was "pretty scared" when she got a call from him in hospital telling her he had been hit by a truck.
She drove down and they stayed overnight in a motel before they travelled back to Ashburton yesterday, where he expects to be off work for at least six weeks.
Mr Arrowsmith said because he had been in shock and not thinking clearly after the incident he did not report it to the police until yesterday morning.
He said the driver not stopping had made him lose a little faith in humanity - "I'm a bit disappointed with the whole scenario. I haven't got my head around that. There is no way I could do that. Guilt itself would make me stop."
Senior Sergeant Brian Benn, of Dunedin, said police were appealing to anybody who may be aware of the incident to contact the Dunedin office, including the truck driver.
Oamaru police had searched the area looking for any evidence of the incident, but had been unable to find any.
It was possible the driver was " not aware this has happened", he said.
