Woman sues over escalator pile-up
Pamela Jones fights back tears as she thinks back to the day when she broke her ankle in a human pile-up at the Esplanade railway station after a Telethon Mega Bingo event.
"I honestly thought I was going to die. I thought this is it," the Pinjarra mother said.
Ms Jones, 57, is suing the Public Transport Authority for negligence.
She is claiming up to $50,000 in lost wages and medical bills and for the psychological pain.
Ms Jones and her sister were on their way home along with thousands of others after the bingo event at the Perth Exhibition and Convention Centre when 13 people were injured in the chaos about 4pm on February 8.
"People were actually lining on the platform for tickets and the guards said, 'Don't worry about tickets, just go down the escalators'," she said.
In her statement of claim filed yesterday, it is alleged the transit guards encouraged patrons to "rush" to the platform and the PTA breached its duty of care by not installing an adequate emergency stop system.
Ms Jones said it was not until she got on the escalator that she saw how full the platform was.
"There was nowhere for you to go and I could see what was going to happen," she said.
"That I was going to fall over."
With no room to move on the platform, those on the escalator could not get off.
"I was falling over and people were falling over me," she said.
In the commotion, her foot got caught in the bottom of the escalator and her ankle was broken. She had surgery to repair the bone and was off work for three months.
Ms Jones has had to dip into her superannuation and borrow from friends just to get through "the most trauma I've gone through in my life".
Her lawyer, Jeff Potter, is representing four other women injured in the incident.
A PTA spokesman said an investigation into the incident had been conducted and a report was being finalised.
