A TEENAGE girl suffered two fractured ankles when she jumped into a rock pool at Blairgowrie back beach, Tuesday 16 January.
The Surrey Hills girl – who is reportedly an elite diver – told Channel 7 news she was attempting a strata jump into a pin drop at the rock pool when she hit the sand hard.
“I managed to swim up using my arms and screamed that my ankle was dislocated,” she said. “It was lucky I didn’t go head first.”
Her family at the scene made an emergency call to the Air Ambulance. Paramedics winched her up to the hovering helicopter and she was taken to a waiting road ambulance near St Johns Wood Rd for the trip to Frankston Hospital. A broken tibia and fibula mean she will be confined to a wheelchair for a month.
Sorrento SES’s Evan Rutherford said the rock pool was a popular jumping spot. He said rescue crews were fortunate to be able to call in the helicopter as it was a “very long distance to carry the girl by stretcher up to the top of the steep cliff”.
Beachgoers shaded the girl with umbrellas while they waited for assistance.
First published in the Mornington News – 23 January 2018
