Premium Content  The aunt of a 21-year-old killed in a horror crash on Fatality Free Friday has revealed how their lives were irrevocably altered by her niece s death. Emily Barnett was driving to Gladstone to pick up her mail with a friend when a truck collided with her RAV4 on the Bruce Highway on May 29 last year. In a tragic twist her uncle Leyland Barnett - a well-known driving instructor in Rockhampton who had taught Emily to drive - had shared a post to his Facebook page that morning with the words: Let s make it a Fatality Free Friday . The family are now bracing themselves for the one-year anniversary of Emily s death, which aunt Davina Barnett said brings back painful memories of the day she was told her niece had died.
Councillor Ellen Smith said she had complete faith in Rockhampton s civil operations team when it came to ensuring the quality of local road works. Speaking during the Fatality Free Friday launch on Gladstone Road, Ms Smith said it was up to drivers to drive to the road conditions. A lot of young people get their licences in town then they go driving on unsealed rural roads, she said. They don t know how to handle the gravel and they re driving too fast. Cr Smith said the council spent about $4 million each year upgrading local roads, and she was grateful for the duplication works between Gracemere and Yeppen.