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Bold Keiran buries ghost of accident
From the Lancashire Evening Telegraph, first published Wednesday 29th Jan 2003.
A TEENAGER has visited the site of an horrific accident that left him with a fractured skull.
Keiran Rhodes-Taylor was being trained on a machine, which flattens bags, when the accident happened at Joseph Metcalf Ltd, in Oswaldtwistle,
The 18-year-old became trapped between two conveyor belts and was dragged into the machine on January 9.
He suffered a fractured skull, two fractured cheek bones and a broken jaw. He was in intensive care at Blackburn Royal Infirmary for three days.
This week Keiran visited Joseph Metcalf Ltd, Brookside Lane, to make sure the machine didn't panic him and thank the people who helped him after the accident.
He said: "I didn't recognise the machine. I saw some photographs and there was blood all over the machine which was scary. I'm starting to remember bits about what happened but it's coming back very slowly."
His mother, Jackie, 40, saw the machine while her son was in hospital and said a health and safety inspector told her Keiran should have been dead.
Keiran had two metal plates inserted in his jaw and had elastic bands fitted around his teeth to pull them into place.
He returned to his Central Avenue home, in Oswaldtwistle, a week after the accident but has to visit the hospital three times a week to monitor his progress and for physiotherapy. It is not known how long his full recovery will take but Keiran is determined to go back to work as soon as he is well enough.
He said: "I thought I'd still be in hospital now. The doctors saved my life, I can't thank them enough. I'm going to be off work for some time yet, but I will go back and am looking forward to seeing my workmates.
"Metcalf's have been brilliant and said if I'm not fit for manual work I can do work in the office." Since the accident Keiran has suffered pain in his left arm, headaches, soreness around stitching, memory lapses and hair loss from stress.
Jackie said: "He's a lot better but not up to scratch at the moment. He's a little miracle. Anything that happens now doesn't matter.
"His memory has gone at the moment, he can't remember things after ten minutes. But I'm just glad to have him home. The staff in the intensive care unit, casualty, the ambulance staff and fire crews have worked miracles and his friends have been every day."
Keiran is also being cared for by his girlfriend Dari, 17, Jackie's partner Mark, 41, his sisters Ceri, 21, and Vicky, 11, and brother Paul, 15.
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