Notes:
Widely regarded as one of the best rally drivers from the Southern Hemisphere, New Zealander Peter Bourne, universally known as Possum Bourne, won the New Zealand Rally Championship in 1991, the Australian Rally Championship seven times consecutively, between 1996 and 2002, and earned three times the title of Asia Pacific Rally Champion in 1993, 1994 and 2000. He drove Subaru cars during his whole career, becoming the first New Zealander to be contracted by a factory team to compete in the FIA World Rally Championship, when he drove a Subaru Legacy RS for team Prodrive.

Possum Bourne had entered for the second time in sequence the annual "Race to the Sky" hillclimb, the New Zealand’s premier international hillclimb event, held every Easter. The course started from the floor of the Cardrona Valley, near Wānaka in the Otago region of the South Island of New Zealand, and ran uphill for 15 kilometers, through 137 corners to the top.

On Friday, 18 April 2003, Bourne had been up the hill for a familiarisation run at the wheel of a Subaru Forrester. He had finished his second run on course and was coming back down when at about one and a half kilometers from the bottom of the Waiorau Snow Farm road, he met another group of cars going up the hill. Race competitors, not in their competition cars but in standard road cars, were driving. Amongst them, the Jeep Grand Cherokee in the convoy driven by New Zealander rallyman Mike Barltrop from Queenstown with co-driver Chris Ruane, going over a completely blind brow in dusty conditions ran onto the wrong side of the road. Bourne attempted to avoid the oncoming car and, skidding under heavy braking, swerved - there was a very big drop to the right so he turned left into the bank. But also the other driver took evasive action, and unfortunately into the same bank. The Jeep Grand Cherokee veered and hit Bourne's car on the driver's side when both vehicles were on an area of road 20 meters wide.

As his vehicle tipped over, Barltrop was thrown from his driver's seat and broke his leg. Possum Bourne suffered critical head injuries and was transported to the Dunedin Hospital, where he was listed in critical condition. He never recovered and twelve days later he succumbed to his injuries, on Wednesday, 30 April 2003.

Originally named Peter Raymond George Bourne, he earned his nickname "Possum" when as a teenager, he rolled his mother’s car while trying to avoid a possum crossing the road. He took up rallying in his twenties and soon went on to become the first and to date only New Zealand's professional rally driver. He has been loyal to Subaru for more than two decades, winning all three of the Southern Hemisphere-Pacific region championships and also competing occasionally in Europe and Africa. His best World Rally Championship results were a remarkable third overall in the 1987 Rally of New Zealand, co-driven by Michael Eggleton, and two fourth places in the Rally Australia in 1990 and 1994. In the Safari Rally in Kenya he finished ninth in 1988 and seventh in 1989, then he won outright the China Rally in 2000 and the Japanese Rally Hokkaido in 2002, paired with Mark Stacey in both occasions.

Possum Bourne was survived by his wife Peggy; his two sons, Taylor and Spencer; his daughter, Jazlin; his brother, Geoffrey; his sisters, Deborah and Kristine. Burial is in n Pokeno Cemetery, Pokeno, Waikato District, New Zealand. His son Spencer Bourne followed in his father's footsteps, also becoming a rally driver.

Almost ten years before his death, Possum Bourne was involved in another fatal accident, during a special stage of the 1993 Rally Australia, when his lifelong friend and co-driver Rodger Freeth, nicknamed by friends as "Roj", was killed. Bourne was also injured in the accident. Racing together since 1987, Bourne and Freeth were leading the Australian Rally Championship, before the event. He returned to rallying only one month later, after encouragement from the Freeth family and, in his friend's memory, Bourne displayed a "ROJ" license plate on the front of his rally cars, for the rest of his career.

• Magazine Rally Sprint, issue of September 1996.
• Website Possum Bourne, page http://www.possumbourne.co.nz/index.html .
• Website The New Zealand Herald, article "Kiwi icon Possum Bourne dies", page http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?storyID=3451899&thesection=news&thesubsection=general&thesecondsubsection=&reportid=1062599 .
• Website The New Zealand Herald, article "Possum 'a victim of his skills' ", page http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?storyID=3500962&thesection=news&thesubsection=general&thesecondsubsection=&reportid=1062599 .
• Website The New Zealand Herald, article "Bourne crash driver 'on wrong side'", by Monique Devereux, page http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?reportID=1062599 .
• Website eWRC-Result.com by Tomáš "Shacki" Wanka, page https://www.ewrc-results.com/profile/1210-peter-possum-bourne/ .
• Website Dunedin Hospital School, page http://www.hospital.school.nz .
• Website AUTOSPORT → Forums → The Nostalgia Forum, thread "Speed's Ultimate Price: The Toll", page 34, posting by "Barry Lake", message http://forums.atlasf1.com/showthread.php?postid=1550059#post1550059 .
• Website Race to the Sky, page http://www.racetothesky.com/ .
• Website Rally-base by Tjeerd van der Zee, page http://www.rallybase.nl/index.php?type=profile&driverid=196 .
• Website Experience Queenstown, page http://www.experiencequeenstown.co.nz/news/sport/39/entries-open-for-2006-silverstone-race-to-the-sky.html .
• Website Find-A-Grave: Peter “Possum” Bourne.
• E-mail by Geoff Rainbow, dated 28 January 2004.
• E-mail by Geoff Rainbow, dated 04 February 2004.
• E-mail by Geoff Rainbow, dated 05 February 2004.
• E-mail by Gavin Hughes, dated 20 March 2006.
• E-mail by Carlo Fertitta, dated 22 April 2023.