Aussie man, 21, breaks neck in front of family while on holiday
A young South Australian man is unlikely to ever walk again after he broke his neck diving into shallow water while on a South African holiday.
Gareth Flanagan, 21, was swimming with his family and fiancée Leisha Galluccio in a river at Kleinmond, about 90 km east of Cape Town, when he climbed up on a rock and dived into the water.
He had no idea the water he was diving into was “extremely shallow”, and badly hit his head. He surfaced screaming for help.
All his family and partner could see was the laceration on Mr Flanagan’s head, and expected he might just need some stitches, but his condition was far more serious.
“After being dragged from the water, Gareth told his dad he was unable to feel his legs. Which is when panic mode kicked in,” Rialanna Pochec-Gordon wrote on the fundraising page she set up to support the young chef.
“It took over an hour for emergency services to arrive, and in that time Gareth started going into shock,” she wrote.
Mr Flanagan was placed in an induced coma, which he has since woken from, but he has become paralysed from the waist down.
“The doctors have said he has no chance of ever walking again!” according to the fundraising page.
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“Despite this current paralysis, Gareth has said he can feel pins and needles in his toes, as well as the calf pumps - which is amazing!”
The April 25 accident also left her fiancée with a broken neck, blood bruising and swelling on his spine, and he is on a ventilator after his lung collapsed during surgery on his neck.
Ms Galluccio has remained by his bedside at the Cape Town hospital where Mr Flanagan is undergoing rehab, and breathing unaided for an hour at a time. He has even had a go at using a wheelchair.
The patient will remain in South Africa with his partner until he becomes well enough to fly home, but there is still a considerable amount of rehabilitation to go until he can be released.
Sharing a picture on Friday of her partner lying on his hospital bed, Ms Galluccio reported that he was “doing very well”.
“[The doctors] are hoping to take the tracky (breathing tube) out in a few days and then we will be moving hospitals closer to family for us, and start a bit of rehab just so his wheelchair ready for the plane and then finish his rehab in Australia," she updated to the GoFundMe page.
The fundraising campaign has raised more than $11,000 in just two days towards the Adelaide man’s rehabilitation, to cover bills while the pair are not able to work, and to help modify their home upon their return to Australia.
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