An inquest is to open into the deaths of an East Sussex couple who died in a car crash during a Christmas family holiday in South Africa in 2004.

Jeremy Monk, 49, his wife Kathrine Monk, also 49, of Station Road, Mayfield, along with their daughter Bryony Monk, 21, and her boyfriend, Matthew Inman, 22, both from Falmouth, died in the collision.

Bryony had been at the wheel of a Nissan Almera hire car when it collided with a truck at the Saldanha crossing, on the road between Cape Town and Vredendal, on the country's West Coast, on December 14 2004.

South African police said the truck driver suffered minor injuries and that the Monk family were identified by their surviving daughter, Freya, who was on a separate holiday in South Africa at the time of the crash.

Mr Monk, known as Jerry, and his family had recently bought a house in South Africa where they planned to spend Christmas. His former colleagues remembered him as a devoted, hard-working family man who was educated and well-travelled.

The inquest is being held at Hastings Law Courts, Hastings, East Sussex.