Moment mum takes first steps after losing leg in horrifying airport travelator accident
Since the accident, police have slammed the building’s owners for refusing to hand over CCTV of the incident, which left the woman needing urgent medical attention.
Son Kittirat revealed his mother is “learning to walk again” like a child and that she will sue the airport over the badly maintained travelator.
He said: “My mum walked for 15 minutes and must practice every day. It’s very encouraging. She’s still as beautiful as ever despite everything that has happened. I hope that soon she’ll be running faster than me.”
Bosses at the airport have admitted the walkway, which is used by tens of thousands of people a day, was to blame as three bolts holding the metal surface plate the woman was standing on gave way.
As a result, her left leg plunged through the surface and got stuck in the machinery.
He explained: “The cause of the accident was the surface plate of the walkway falling out of the square rail because three of the four bolts, which are the bolts at A, B, C seen in the picture, were not able to support the plate.
“While rolling down at the end of the slideway, only the bolt in position D stayed in place. The passenger’s leg then fell through the gap.
“During the 10 seconds that the travelator continued to push forward, the passenger’s leg that had dropped to the E position was pushed forward against a metal edge, causing serious injury.”
Police have hit out at the owners of Airports of Thailand (AoT) for not handing officers surveillance footage of the accident.
Police Colonel Adirek Thongkaemkaew, chief of the city’s Don Muang district police, said they haven’t received any evidence from the airport despite asking for it last week.
Officers are still collecting witness accounts and other evidence following the injury close to the departure gate.
He added: “The airport has been cooperative in previous cases. We will continue to repeat the requests for the CCTV.”
The accident happened at around 8.30 when the passenger was walking to the gate for a flight to Nakhon Si Thammarat province.
The force of her fall caused her leg to plunge through the end of the walkway. She screamed in horror as her foot became stuck in the metal gap while the machinery churned through her muscle, tendons and bones.
Onlookers fumbled to turn off the emergency switch as the machine continued tearing through her flesh – spewing blood onto the metal tracks.
Paramedics amputated her leg on-site at the airport in order to free her from the travelator before she was carried out on a stretcher – with her foot in a foam box loaded into the ambulance.
Following the accident, staff at the Don Mueang International Airport – which has a separate military terminal on the opposite side which is used by the country’s King – closed all of 20 their automatic walkways.
The other airports around the country also began frantically checking their devices amid fears of further accidents.
In a statement, the Don Mueang Airport said: “The director of Don Mueang Airport and management has visited the patient to follow up on the treatment and received information from the medical team at Bhumibol Hospital that she is currently in the process of receiving treatment from the medical team.
“Don Mueang Airport is deeply saddened by the incident and ready to fully accept the responsibility as well as take care of the medical expenses and compensation.”
State-owned Airports of Thailand (AOT) runs the facility and the company is reportedly “the most-valuable airport operator in the world” due to the country’s popularity as a tourism destination and its rapidly growing domestic economy.