Hi my name is James and I am a firefighter of 6 years working in Sydney Australia.

My story begins on 1 July 2000 when our station was called out to a factory fire in a near by suburb. It was a plastics factory housing sports drinks bottle tops. When we arrived there were other crews at work and lots of smoke issuing. It was just like any other factory fire I had attended. We got our protective gear on and helped get water from the hydrants into the fire truck. Then putting on our breathing apparatus myself and my partner headed for the building looking for work. We walked past the building on fire keeping our distance as flames had started to show through a vent near the roof. I looked at the other crews at work to see where we may be needed. The next thing I knew I was on the ground covered in bricks.

The gable wall supporting the roof one story up had collapsed onto me. I could feel large chunks of hot bricks and mortar on my legs which I tried to kick off. I could not feel my left arm and thought it had been severed as I was lying on it and could not see it. Other firefighters came to my rescue and draged me out. I was happy to see my arm shoot up in the air when lifted I could not feel or move it but at least it was still attatched.

I was taken to hospital and put through just about every test imaginable. I had severe crush injury to my left foot. A broken shoulder blade and a left bpi. I was lucky enough to see and talk to my wife (who was 4 months pregnant with our first child Tommy) before I went into surgery.

I spent 8 weeks in hospital. During this time I watched my toes die and amputated along with a portion of my foot. I lost the use of biceps, triceps, deltoids and rotator cuff muscles and just to add to my situation my grandmother died.
So it was a pretty rough 2 months.

My partner was lucky he was 2 metres behind me and was missed by the falling wall. Two other firefighters were injured they sustained neck and back strains and are back to full duties. My helmet was buckled which probably saved my life.

In September I had surgery on my bp. A nerve was taken from my little fingers and transfered into my biceps. The same was done from my trapezius into my rotator cuff. I also had a nerve removed from my right calf and used to graft and repair the nerve into my deltoids.

One thing I cant fathom is the feeling my wife Frankie must have felt when she received the call telling her about what had happened. Thinking about this always brings a tear to my eye. What kept me going was the love and support I received from family and friends. Unfortunately Frankie's father died in March of pancriatic cancer. Luckily I got to thank him for all his support while I was in hospital and let him know I would look after his little girl.

I have just past the 11 month mark. I am back at work doing data enty duties. The Fire Brigades have been great they really looked after me. Thank god for workers compensation though it is still a struggle to get things approved by the insurance company. But thats a different story. My tricep has fully recovered without surgery. My bicep is improving. Very weak but I can just bend at the elbow with effort. Still nothing in the deltoids or rotator cuff. An emg in 2 weeks may tell me more.

At first I found it very hard to cope with the fact that I would not be able to do every day things regarding our new baby. As time goes on however I am learning that there are ways around that and really I have no excuses(even when it comes to changing smelly nappies).

Finding this web site has really taken a load off my shoulders. It has really been great to get the chance to tell my story. And anyone please feel free to contact my to compare scars. Oh yeah, only 23 more days untill this crummy year is over.

James

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