"I felt like we were going to die, we were all going to die."
That is what father Laurie Strathdee says ran through his mind as a Kenworth truck slammed into his station wagon, spinning the family car and sending it rolling down an embankment.
The impact, which occurred on the Hume Highway southwest of Sydney in November 2004, severely injured Mr Strathdee and killed his six-year-old son Rian, as well as injuring an 11-year-old boy.
Truck driver Allan Michael Dyson is facing trial in Goulburn District Court nearly two decades later after pleading not guilty to dangerous driving occasioning death and grievous bodily harm.
The now-61-year-old has admitted being behind the wheel of the Kenworth truck but denies he did anything wrong.
Mr Strathdee on Friday told the court he had reclined his seat back and was offering his ice cream to the 11-year-old when he saw bright lights from a vehicle behind him just before the impact.
"There was a crunch, a bang, we were hit," he said.
"It was like we were suddenly going really fast and I felt like flying through the air."
He then blacked out, waking up to find he was hanging upside-down by his seat-belt inside the family's Subaru.
Dyson's barrister Harry Maarraoui has pointed the finger at Mr Strathdee's wife Jasmine Payget and how she was driving as she exited a petrol station at Sutton Forest and pulled onto the highway.
She earlier told the jury she did not look at the speedometer but felt like she was driving at between 100 and 110km/h as she merged onto the highway.
Under questioning by Mr Maarraoui, Mr Strathdee admitted he told police in 2004 and 2019 as well as an independent crash construction expert in 2007 that they were travelling at 80km/h at the time.
He also said he told police the truck was around 10m behind the car when he noticed the lights behind them.
But these were just "guesstimates" and he had no real evidence of the speed or distance between the vehicles, Mr Strathdee told the court.
Because the impact was "almost immediate" after he saw the lights, the truck would have been closer, he said.
Another driver, Richard Keijda, was travelling down the Hume Highway that night.
He told the jury a B-Double truck with a stainless steel bull-bar got "uncomfortably close" to the rear of his Toyota Cressida.
"I actually had to speed up to avoid a collision from the truck coming behind us," he said.
Mr Keijda thought he accelerated the car to around 130km/h before the truck stopped gaining on him.
The truck sat behind him at this speed for around 30 seconds before overtaking, the jury heard.
"I was a bit concerned at the driving behaviour," Mr Keijda said.
Later, he saw the truck ahead of him "shudder" and watched as the lights of Ms Payget and Mr Strathdee's Subaru swung around.
He then drove past the car as it lay upside-down by the side of the highway before returning to the site to assist the family, the court was told.
The trial before Judge Ross Hudson continues.
