Truck crash survivor five years on - December 7, 2023 - The Standard
WATCH: Paul Edge discusses the near-fatal truck crash that resulted in the loss of his right leg.
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00:00 Once people are dead, they're dead.
00:02 It's everyone else that suffers from it.
00:05 Family, community, workmates.
00:09 - First responders.
00:10 - First responders, people that witness it.
00:13 People don't need to see stuff like that on the roads.
00:16 And they'll never forget it.
00:18 - I felt so scared about the future if he wasn't with me.
00:23 The emotional trauma.
00:26 - Yeah.
00:26 - Yeah, it's...
00:29 Well, you don't forget it.
00:30 It never goes away.
00:32 - Does it?
00:33 - You can sort of move on with physical things, but yeah.
00:37 - It's stuck with you.
00:38 It's there forever.
00:39 - I can smell diesel now.
00:42 And it takes me back to when I was in Warrnambool
00:46 at the emergency and they said,
00:48 "You can give Paul a kiss goodbye to go on the helicopter."
00:53 And that's what I could smell then.
00:56 And that's just a instant on back there.
01:00 - What would you say to people who think
01:01 that it won't happen to them?
01:03 - It does.
01:05 My boss said to me, one of my bosses said to me,
01:08 and they're more like mates than bosses.
01:09 He saw me in hospital and he said to me,
01:14 "This one shouldn't have happened to you."
01:16 He said, "There's 25 other blokes
01:18 "that are driving around in our trucks."
01:19 And he said, "It wouldn't surprise me
01:21 "if someone rang up and said it happened to them."
01:23 But he said, "This shouldn't happen to you.
01:24 "You don't even move your truck in the yard
01:26 "without a seatbelt on."
01:27 But one of the mechanics from work,
01:31 when they came out to the truck,
01:32 he said he'd seen me seatbelt was cut,
01:34 so he knew that I had it on.
01:36 So I knew that I'd have been mincemeat
01:39 on the side of the road if I hadn't.
01:41 Get up five minutes earlier,
01:43 chuck the phone in the boot.
01:44 Lowest distraction, I believe.
01:49 - And think about those that will be affected.
01:52 Like, just take a minute to put yourself
01:55 in a position where you're gonna--
01:58 - You've got the knock on the door
01:59 that someone's died.
02:01 - Yeah.
02:02 - Don't say passed away, died.
02:04 'Cause that's what's happened, they've been killed.
02:06 They didn't pass or anything like that, but killed.
02:09 - Just so grateful for the help that we had.
02:13 First off, at the accident scene
02:17 and the emergency workers and everything.
02:21 It's kept our family as a unit.
02:25 - And going back even further,
02:28 the people that lobbied to get the hens to warm,
02:33 they are my heroes.
02:36 - Yeah.
02:37 - I wouldn't be here without 'em.
02:39 - Yeah, no, that's right.
02:41 - Not a chance.
02:44 (silence)
02:46 [BLANK_AUDIO]