Lucky to be alive

THANKS TO ALL: Great-grandmother Carrie Shilton, 62, of Takou Bay is glad to have survived and grateful to those who helped her. Her dog Pooky is happy to keep her company as she mends.

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Carrie Shilton thought she was going to die last week but as she waited to be cut out of her crashed vehicle, she decided she wasn’t ready.

She has a two-year-old great-granddaughter and wants to be around for a while yet.

The Takou Bay great-grandmother has had some bad breaks. Her first husband, Mike Finlay, was a crew member of the ill-fated Air New Zealand flight TE901 that slammed into Mt Erebus and her son was seriously injured in a motorcycle accident on Christmas Day 15 years ago. He’s worked hard to be able to walk again.

Last Monday Carrie was travelling south from a meeting in Kaeo to her home at Takou Bay when her Toyota car went into a skid on the Kaeo hill.

The road was wet and glassy after a shower of rain in the morning.

"I remember glancing down at the speedometer and seeing that I was doing 80kmh. When I lifted my eyes, I realised the back of my car was not where it should be."

The car flipped into a bank and Carrie was trapped. It flashed through her mind that she wouldn’t be able to watch her two-year-old great- granddaughter grow up.

"I played a tune on my horn as an alert."

Things happened fast with a young woman, Jessie, climbing into the wrecked car to comfort her and help turn the engine off. Police, ambulance and volunteer fire brigade officers from Kaeo and Kerikeri arrived and moved quickly to free her.

"They thought I had a broken pelvis but I ended up with two tiny scratches and bruising. They said I was the luckiest person ever."

Carrie was fully conscious throughout the rescue. She was taken to Bay of Islands Hospital in Kawakawa. She’s now home again nursing her bruised body but otherwise uninjured.

She says she is keen to tell her story because she wants to heap praise on all those who came to her rescue.

Carrie also wants to warn people about the risk of driving on wet roads after a dry period and she wants
to advise people to get woollen covers for their seat belts.

"Mostly I want to talk about it because every person who touched me did so with nothing but love.

"That includes Jessie from Kingfish Lodge, fire brigade officers, ambulance officers Robin and Maureen, medical people Ian, Juliana, Bay of Islands Hospital head nurse Kathy (Kelly) and Daniel – constable Daniel Cleaver – from the Kaeo police who came to see how I was doing the day after the accident. I’ll never let anyone say anthing bad about police again," she says.

- © Fairfax NZ News