The vehicle left the road and overturned and a passenger in the vehicle, 20 year old Kathleen Margaret Hay from around Fyvie, was killed. The driver, a 22-year-old male, believed Kathleen's partner, and a child passenger, thought to be their 18 month old daughter, were unhurt and did not require any hospital treatment.

Inspector Scott Mann of Grampian Police Road Policing Unit is heading the investigation. He said: "We are currently making enquiries to determine what may have caused this collision. These enquiries are at a very early stage. The weather was atrocious in the area at the time of the incident and this will be taken into account by our Collision Investigators. Whatever the cause may be, a young woman has died tragically tonight and my thoughts are with her family at this sad time.

"I appeal to anyone who witnessed the collision or who was driving in the Rothienorman area about 9.35 pm on Friday evening to contact Grampian Police on (0845) 600 5 700 as soon as possible."

In a family statement, Kathleen's mother and father, Lorna and Allan Riddoch said: "We are all absolutely devastated by the loss of our wonderful Kath who has been taken from us so suddenly and so unexpectedly.

"We still cannot believe she has gone and we don't know when we are ever going to be able to come to terms with what has happened."

Kathleen, who worked as a checkout operator at Tesco in Ellon and previously as an assistant manager at the Ashvale Restaurant in Ellon, was a former pupil of Turriff's Markethill Primary School and Turriff Academy and had worked as a hairdresser for a time after leaving school.

They added: " Kath and her partner Joe, who had been together for four years, worshipped the ground each other walked on. They were a true love match and adored Katie who was born 18 months ago. Her whole life changed when Katie came along.

"She was such a loving, caring person. She was close to all her family, had a wonderful relationship with her gran, her big brother, Brian, who she always called Bro Brian. She doted on his little boy and girl, Brian and Courtney and everybody who came into contact with her loved her. She had umpteen cats and dogs and Katie even shared the same name as one of her dogs.

"Her pleasures were simple. She loved her music, her DVDs, going for a Chinese or and Indian meal and going shopping with me."

Having visited the scene of the collision to lay flowers at the weekend, Mr and Mrs Riddoch said had been amazed at the outpouring of love shown by all sorts of people and also the many instances of grief and love shown for Kath by a number of people on the Bebo website.

They said: " Our family have only got out memories left of a very special and wonderful person who brought such light into our lives. We'll never forget her smiling face or the sound of her voice."