‘It had to be a miracle’
Bay victim of horrific taxi accident tells of slow, painful recovery
TINY Tamzyn Brass was given little chance of survival after she was rammed through a brick wall by a runaway taxi that pinned her to the inside wall of a shop in Uitenhage Road, Port Elizabeth.
Speaking from Livingstone Hospital yesterday, the brave 20-year-old took her first steps after her third operation since the horrific ordeal on January 10.
Brass’s story not only highlights her own fight for full recovery but the plight of all taxi accident victims who pay the price, sometimes for an awfully long time after the crash.
When Brass arrived at the hospital after the accident with blood streaming from her ears and life- threatening injuries, desperate paramedics told each other there was only one thing more they could do and that was pray.
“When we got to the hospital, a paramedic was whispering a prayer in my ear,” Brass, a tracking agent, said.
She was on her way to work when the accident happened. She was day-dreaming about the new dress and necklace she was wearing.
There is not much else she can remember about the accident in which the driver, Mzawepheli Hlabani, died and his 12 passengers were slightly injured.
“I don’t remember much about my accident. I remember walking down the road and then I woke up in hospital. I remember people were busy all over me and I couldn’t speak.
“Later, the doctors came to tell me my leg was broken and there was a piece missing from my big toe, my pelvis was broken, my other leg was injured and I was bleeding internally,” said Brass, who was pinned to the inside wall of Ecno Print Repairs and Supplies by the taxi after it rammed her through a brick wall.
After spending seven days in the intensive care unit and six weeks in Ward 3B, Brass was discharged from hospital but then returned last week for a third operation to her leg that was left mangled after the accident that almost claimed her life.
Yesterday, she picked up her crutches for the first time again after the operation.
“She is very strong and determined to walk,” her aunt, Cathy Jegels, 53, said.
“At first, I didn’t cry, but afterwards, it got to me when I realised I couldn’t walk. I started thinking about the accident and my injuries.
“I got frustrated at times. I couldn’t even go to the bathroom. I would lash out and start shouting at my mother,” Brass said.
“I am not used to seeing my legs so thin. Even now it is a little sore. When I saw my legs for the first time in ICU, the cuts were yellow and deep. My poor heart broke.
“They first stabilised me. Then I needed a second operation to put a plate in my leg. but I still can’t walk. My hip gets weak but I am doing much better.”
Brass is treated by a physiotherapist daily, but admits the pain is sometimes so severe she wants to cry.
“Every day I try to be positive. I pray and ask God to give me strength to get me through the day.
“Sometimes I feel like I am enjoying it here at the hospital. We laugh a lot. God sends me people to cheer me up. It is hard to lie here and do nothing. God knows I like to laugh a lot.
“When my family showed me the pictures of my accident, I couldn’t believe it was me in that accident. The driver passed away and I am alive. It had to have been a
WELCOME GULA TAXI DRIVER
A FORMER taxi driver has told how he would pray every morning that he would be alone in the vehicle if he ever had an accident.
But this was not to be when the taxi Welcome Gula was driving with a full load of passengers in Walmer’s Target Kloof on a September afternoon in 2009 was in a collision with two other vehicles.
His leg was badly injured, he is no longer able to drive and he has difficulty walking.
“Once you are injured people look at you differently. I lost many of my friends.
“I feel bad because I am a husband but I cannot even put something on the table for my family.”
Gula, 48, of Walmer township, was a taxi driver for five years until the accident in 2009. “There was construction on the road and only one lane was open.
“There was a vehicle behind me. The vehicle started hooting. Then the vehicle hit the taxi.
“The taxi hit a lamppost and went over the island. Then an oncoming vehicle crashed into us,” he said.
“The next thing I saw was the paramedics. I was stuck in the vehicle. My leg was bleeding. I couldn’t get out. They had to cut the vehicle to get me out. They took me to Livingstone Hospital.
“We went to court three times after the accident. The fourth time they said they couldn’t get hold of the other driver. The case was dropped,” Gula said.
“I feel very sorry for my passengers. Taxi drivers are bad drivers.
“Some are careful but in general many of them are bad drivers. Some need to be taught to drive carefully.
“There is not enough traffic enforcement on the roads. The taxi drivers get away with a lot of traffic offences. Many of them don’t even have licences,” he said.
“It is very difficult for me to take a taxi now. I try to avoid it – but some days I have no choice.”
SIYANDA MATHOBELA PASSENGER
FIGHTING her way back to health after breaking both legs in the Target Kloof taxi accident was one thing for Siyanda Mathoble, but putting up with relentless bullying was another. In fact, it got so bad she had to change schools.
“Nobody wanted to be my friend anymore because I walked too slowly. They would call me ‘bottle legs’ and laugh,” said the 19-year-old Walmer township resident who was 15 at the time of the accident.
Her most vivid memory of the crash was that “I wanted to pick up my legs to get out, but I couldn’t move them”.
She was in hospital for four weeks, and used a wheelchair for six weeks. She cannot walk for long, and gets dizzy and hot when she stands for too long.
“I went back to school. I was bullied a lot and bunked a lot because of this. I had to go for physiotherapy until I could walk again but my legs are not getting better.
“I have a lot of pain when the weather changes. I can’t do sport – but I can get around a little . . . Taxis are not safe.”
JOSEPHINE NYEPHA PASSENGER
AFTER she was injured in the devastating taxi accident in Target Kloof, Josephine Nyepha’s family refused even to give her R4.50 to buy her little boy bread.
“You are nothing to your family when you are injured,” said Nyepha, who cannot walk far. Before the accident Nyepha had lots of friends and a regular job – now she has neither.
She says: “I will never forget the day my little one wanted bread. I went to my sister to ask for R4.50. She said no.
“If you can’t work, you are nothing to your family,” said Nyepha, 42, who lives in Walmer township with her mom and her two children, aged 10 and 20.
“On the day of the accident, I was coming home from the hospital. My father had died and I went to get his documents.”
She first heard hooting, felt the taxi swerve, the jolt from hitting a lamppost and then the thud from hitting an oncoming vehicle. She lost consciousness.
Nyepha was in hospital for 14 weeks during which one of her hips was replaced. But there were complications, so she had to have another hip operation.
Later, she was readmitted to hospital for six weeks. After a “fight for survival”, she qualified for a disability grant. She said the driver of her taxi was not at fault.
“There was an old man who drove into us from the back.
“We went to the court for our case. The magistrate said that the old man who drove into us was from overseas. He said the old man did not care about us. They told us not to come back.”
Now, “at night I cannot sleep on the bed. I have too much pain. I have to sleep in a chair. All this because of the carelessness of other people”.
Months after the accident, the first time she went down Target Kloof in a taxi, “I was screaming”. She said: “After that I had to go for counselling. I am better now. But some days the memories come back. I don’t know why.”