On Friday March 24, truck driver David Durbin went to work, but tragically he never made it home.
The loving father of two young boys, aged 5 and 6, and devoted partner to Nikisha Smith, who he planned to marry, had just returned from Fiji a few weeks prior. It was the first time he had ever been overseas.
David was killed when his B-double rolled and caught fire while exiting the Pacific Motorway near Brunswick Heads at around 6am.
Heartbroken by the loss, his brother Dylan Durbin said David wasn’t just his big brother, he was also one of his best mates.
“David was just a really good guy – and anyone who met him, loved him,” said Dylan.
He was also a hard worker, who began working in the construction industry from the age of 15 before turning to trucking.
“He’s been driving trucks for two or three years. He started out in the smaller rigs and worked his way up to the B-doubles. When we used to play as kids, he would say he wouldn’t mind truck driving, so I think it was something he always wanted to do.
“But he was actually looking at getting out of trucking for a bit and getting back into metal roofing with me. We had that conversation only a week before the crash.”
A doting father, David absolutely adored his boys. “He wanted to do the best he could to provide for them as well as his partner. He gave her a promise ring while they were in Fiji. He loved his boys with everything he had. He was doing these interstate trips and late hours so he could get himself ahead. Unfortunately, that didn’t work out,” said Dylan.
He added that he and his brother were inseparable. “He lived with our dad and I lived with my mum until I was six years old, but then I moved in with them and from there, it was just the three of us. We moved to Wollongong and then David moved to Brisbane when he had his first born, and I followed him there.
“David had a lot of truckie friends who adored him. He was also into motorbikes and it was the same with his motorcycle group. He went out with them nearly every weekend. He loved motorbike riding. It’s what he always did in his spare time. He was very much a country bumpkin. He preferred the country life over the city life. That’s why he’d ride to all these picturesque outback places. He couldn’t sit still, he was always doing something.”
David Durbin will be laid to rest this Thursday April 6. A GoFundMe page has been set up by his family to help cover the funeral costs, with the remainder going into a trust account for his two young sons.