Caroline Cassidy, from Birr, but now living in Walsh Island, was delighted to meet up with Eoghan Connolly, a member of the crew of the National Aeromedical air ambulance, for the first time she was airlifted from Clonbullogue Airfield last August. Photo: Paul Molloy

Caroline owes her life to air ambulance service

An Offaly woman who sustained a spinal fracture during a parachute jump at Clonbullogue airfield last August says she owes her life to the air ambulance service personnel who were drafted in to airlift her to Tallaght Hospital where she was successfully treated for her injuries.

At a celebration in Casement Aerodrome, Baldonnel, on Wednesday of this week to mark the 10th anniversary of the Athlone-based Emergency Aeromedical Service (EAS), Caroline Cassidy from Walsh Island, came face to face for the first time with Eoghan Connolly, the Advanced Paramedic who looked after her during the transfer from Clonbullogue to Tallaght.

It was an emotional meeting for the duo, with Caroline recalling the “bit of good-humoured banter” they had on the journey, despite the fact that she was completely immobilised in a vacuum mattress for the duration of the trip.

“I have great time for Eoghan and for all the crew, they were just amazing, exceptional,” says the instructor at Clonbullogue airfield, who adds that she owes her life to their “professionalism and dedication.”

Recalling the accident, Caroline Cassidy, who is originally from Birr, describes herself as “an experienced jumper” but during a routine parachute jump last August her parachute failed to open and she “landed hard” on her buttocks.

“I had broken my leg a few years ago so I suppose I was trying to save the leg, but in landing on my bum the force of the impact ricocheted off my back and fractured my T12 (vertebra),” she says, adding that, at first she did not realise the seriousness of the injury.

“We have a paramedic on site, so a land ambulance was called, and I suppose I was more embarrassed than anything else when I was told the air ambulance was on the way,” she laughs.

Caroline, who was accompanied at Wednesday’s celebration by her two daughters, Ashton, who is in her 3rd year of nurse training in UL, and Kara, said her family are used to her skydiving and parachuting “so they know the emergency drill.”

However, they quickly realised “something was wrong” as their mother was experiencing “funny sensations” in her fingers and toes as well as severe back pain.

Eoghan Connolly, who is originally from Finglas, but spends half of his working year attached to the air ambulance in Athlone, said the crew had airlifted Caroline from Clonbullogue to the Trauma Unit in Tallaght Hospital “within 15 minutes of getting in the air” and it took just under an hour from when the initial call was logged to her receiving expert medical treatment in Tallaght.

Caroline herself describes the roads in North Offaly as being “absolutely disgraceful” and she estimates that it would have taken a land ambulance “at least three or four hours” to transfer her from the airfield in Clonbullogue to Tallaght. “The bog roads are very humpback so a land ambulance would only have been able to travel at 10 to 20 mph at the most, so I don’t even want to think of what the outcome might have been if we didn’t have an air ambulance service, it is just a brilliant service.”

As an instructor at the local airfield, Caroline Cassidy says it is “very reassuring” to know that the Emergency Aeromedical Service is based in nearby Athlone.

After spending four months in a back brace, she is now “fighting fit” and back to her skydiving exploits, and she says she find it hard to “put into words” her gratitude to Eoghan Connolly and the entire air ambulance team who came to her aid last August.

“They are literally life-savers,” she adds.