Scaffold collapse survivor
Tuesday 19th May 2009
Ever had a really bad day? The boiler packs up, so you have to have a cold shower. You miss the bus or get locked out. Sometimes, it takes just the smallest thing, and suddenly, it feels like the world is against you. That's how I used to be. Just being late for work and I'd be in a mood all day. But on 4 January 2005, I had a really bad day. In fact, that's the understatement of the century. I'd left the flat I was renting in Edinburgh and was walking along Palmerston Place towards the office where I worked as a fraud officer at the Royal Bank of Scotland. One minute, I was striding along past a big house covered in scaffolding. The next, there was a loud creak of metal and the four-storey scaffolding started to crumple like a pack of cards.
I could feel the adrenalin surging through my body as my brain told my legs to run. I raced toward the church on the other side of the road, but I wasn't fast enough. A metal pole slammed into my back, and I was hurled face down onto the wet pavement as bricks and planks rained down on top of me. Eventually, after what felt like a lifetime, the crashing and banging stopped and I lay there, pinned to the ground by the crushing weight of the rubble, gasping for breath. 'Help me,' I coughed, choking on the thick red dust. As I tried to move, an unbearable pain shot through my back. Then the panic hit me. I've broken my back, I thought. I'm paralysed. I'm going to die. I felt my body getting weaker, my eyelids getting heavy. Then, in the darkness, I heard something. 'Can you hear me?' a woman shouted. 'We're going to get you out!' Relief hit me, but by then, I was too weak to call out, so all I could do was lie there, listening to the sound of myself gasping for air. Then I felt something warm and soft, as someone held my hand. Someone else was cutting the red and black rucksack off my back. 'We're going to use a pole to lift the scaffolding off you,' a man shouted. 'Can you wriggle out?' To be honest, I had no idea, but I had to try. 'One, two, three…heave!' he shouted.
As the huge weight pressing down on my back lifted, I summoned all my strength, and managed to inch my body backwards out of the rubble. As I lay on the pavement, a fire crew cut away the rubble with saws and used inflatable airbags to lever the rest of the debris out of the way and lift me onto a stretcher. It was more than an hour before I was freed and rushed to Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. I was given gas and air and a blood transfusion before being hooked up to drips and sedated. After an MRI scan, the doctor came to see me. 'You've broken all your ribs,' he explained. 'You have internal bleeding, bruised lungs, and six broken vertebrae in your back. Your right leg has snapped and shards of the bone have punctured the skin.' By then, I was so dosed up with painkillers, I could hardly take it in. So I just lay there, drifting in and out of sleep, until two hours later, when my mum, Anne, now 62, and dad, Iain, 63, arrived.
The rest of the day passed in a blur, but the next morning, I was front page news. WOMAN HIT AS SCAFFOLDING FALLS 50 FEET, one headline screamed. The nurse told me there was a film crew camped outside the hospital, desperate to talk to me. 'Shall I read you the story?' Dad asked me. I shook my head. 'I was there,' I gulped. 'I don't need reminding.' It was the last thing I needed. In the days that followed, surgeons inserted metal rods in my leg and fused four of my vertebrae together, before inserting a metal rod into my spine. 'It's a risky operation,' the consultant warned. 'Even slicing open your back could dislodge a bone and paralyse you.' I nodded, barely taking it in. 'I just want the pain to stop,' I whispered. I'd never known anything like it. After nine days in intensive care, I was transferred onto a ward, but it was another two months before I was allowed home. By then, the lease on my flat was up, so I moved back in with Dad. He and Mum had split up seven years earlier. But back at home, my battle was just beginning. First I had to learn to walk again. I needed a wheelchair to get around, and had physiotherapy every day. Dad had to help me wash and dress and I couldn't even feed myself. With his and Mum's help, I stuck at the physio and gradually, I could take a few steps with crutches. My body was healing, but on the inside, I was worse than ever.
Not a night went by without me waking up in a cold sweat after a terrifying nightmare. I was trapped under the rubble again, tasting the red dust in my mouth, gasping for breath as my lungs felt like they would burst… I became a virtual prisoner in Dad's house. Just the slightest sound of wind outside, and I'd clamp my eyes shut and put my hands over my ears. 'Come on, love,' Dad would say, trying to coax me out of bed. 'Let's go out. I'll be there.' 'I can't,' I whispered, curling up in a ball too scared to open my eyes. And so it went on. Too scared to sleep, too scared to stay awake. It took two months of counselling before the nightmares dwindled and I finally left the house for the first time. As Dad wheeled me around the supermarket, I looked down at my withered, frail body and couldn't hold back the tears. 'I can't cope any more,' I wept. 'What if I never get better?' 'You're getting there,' Dad insisted. 'You can get through this.' I didn't share his enthusiasm, but Mum did, and a year after the accident, in January 2006, she brought me the newspaper cuttings of the accident. 'You're so lucky to be alive,' she said. 'Look how far you've come.' I stared in disbelief at the massive picture splashed across the front page. A mound of bricks, metal poles and wooden planks reached towards the sky. 'I was under that?' I gasped. I read in horror that a streetlamp had snapped under the weight of the scaffolding, forming an arch, which prevented the full force of the metal hitting me. It had saved my life. 'You're right,' I whispered. 'I am lucky to be alive.'
Until then, I'd tried to block out my memories of that horrific day, but in a weird way, seeing it there in black and white made me realise just how lucky I had been. It was a turning point. Now I was determined to get better, no matter what. Seven months on, in August 2006, I could walk with a stick and went back to work part-time. I didn't need to block out that day any more. In fact, I wanted answers. Why had it happened? Who was to blame? An investigator from the Health and Safety Executive had come to see me in hospital and taken a statement, and AAA Scaffolding were charged with breaching health and safety regulations. On 5 March 2007, I hobbled into Edinburgh Sheriff Court to watch as they pleaded guilty. Dad sat next to me and we listened as Sheriff Nigel Morrison, QC, fined AAA Scaffolding £48,750. Turns out that the partially dismantled scaffolding wasn't secured properly. I felt so angry. I was still in pain, my confidence was in tatters, I'd been told it would be difficult for me to have kids and it was likely I'd have osteoarthritis. But then I listened as the Health and Safety executive principal inspector said the accident could have led to many deaths.
Mum and Dad were right. I'd had a really lucky escape and I owed it to myself to make the most of it. First, I filed a claim for compensation. 'People say it's not about the money,' I told Mum. 'They're right.' No amount of money could have made up for what I'd been through the past 19 months, but it could help me get my life back on track. After months of physical and psychological assessments, in January 2008, I settled out of court. But with that sorted, there was still something I had to do. 'You can't put it off forever,' Dad said. 'I'll go with you.' 'It's OK,' I said. 'I want to do this on my own.' So, four months after my settlement came through, I finally plucked up the courage to walk down Palmerston Place again. As I passed the sandstone buildings, I tensed as I waited for that creak of metal, braced myself for the feeling of agony as the poles slammed into my back. Only, of course, they didn't. The road had been resurfaced and the scaffolding removed. It was like the accident had never happened, apart from the one modern lamppost which had replaced the one which had saved my life. By the time I made it to the end of the street, I felt fantastic. Finally, I'd faced my fear and more importantly, I'd realised that the accident had actually been a blessing in disguise. Why? Because it made me realise that there are more important things to worry about in life than your hair not going right or the bus being late. After my miraculous escape, I'm determined to make the most of every wonderful minute.