Strangers in a Peruvian hospital donated blood, while the friends of Emily Wornes ran from one pharmacy to the next collecting medical supplies. Their efforts saved the Albury woman's life, after she fell 14 metres from a hostel roof and, somehow, survived. Tahlia McPherson reports.
RON Wornes’ shaking hands scrolled through images from Peru as the Albury father tried to put into words what his daughter, Emily, had lived through.
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The free-spirited 23-year-old was having "the time of her life" travelling through South America, when one wrong step changed everything on December 15.
Within a split-second, Emily went from soaking in the beauty of a South American sunset to falling 14 metres onto a marble floor.
Broken bones, fractures and dislocations plagued her feet, ankles, toes and pelvis.
Her right elbow shattered and the L3 vertebra in her spine “exploded” on impact.
It wasn't just the physical pain from the fall which left her father heartbroken.
What came next, was a matter of life or death.
“If you haven't got money, you'd die,” Mr Wornes said.
“Everything had to be paid in cash.”
Emily, originally from Albury, managed a cafe in Brisbane but took time off to travel.
She was watching the sunset on the roof of a hostel in Huanchaco, eight hours north of the capital Lima, with her friend, Georgia Rose, and people they met 10 days earlier.
Emily left to go to the bathroom and when she walked back up, the group had moved.
She was walking over to them when she stood on a sky light covered with fibreglass.
“Emily didn’t know, there were no barriers, but there was a penetration for a skylight in every floor,” Mr Wornes said.
“She stepped on it and fell straight through four floors, hitting nothing on the way down … Emily just disappeared as she was walking towards her friends.
“They found her crumpled on the floor and thought she was dead.
“They touched her and her eyes flicked open and she started screaming.
She laid there on a trolley for two days without any painkillers. I don’t know how she lived through it
- Ron Wornes
“What came was a paramedic fire truck, they put her on a board - that's all they had - and took her to the local clinic.”
To compound fears for Emily, thieves pinched some of their phones while they helped get her to hospital.
Mr Wornes fought back tears as he described his daughter's medical care.
He said he “owed everything” to a young Sydney man named Nick, who could speak a bit of Spanish – which he believed kept Emily alive.
“The clinic had nothing,” Mr Wornes said.
“It had no painkillers, she laid there on a trolley for two days without any painkillers – I don’t know how she lived through it.”
Georgia, who studied fashion at Billy Blue College of Design with Emily, said the reality of the Peruvian hospital system was difficult to comprehend.
“Even if she needed a needle, I'd have to buy the needle and the medicine to go in it,” she said.
“I had to run around to different pharmacies to get all the parts for a drip.
“She was lying there in pain the whole time, it was so horrible.
“Emily ended up needing about six litres of blood and it was so hard to get.
“Thankfully we met so many nice people in hospital, families of other patients, who would help translate or donate blood.
“It’s so shocking, we found out three years ago a 16-year-old boy died (falling) through the same roof at the same hostel.
“It all happened so fast, it's hard to think about.”
Mr Wornes said Emily's friends from the hostel chipped in for a $12,000 spinal plate and a kind-hearted stranger, who heard about her fall, lent $6000 for the life-saving surgery.
It took three excruciating days before enough money was raised for the operation.
Mr Wornes and his wife, Janet, arrived at the clinic on December 18 – while Emily’s two sisters Hannah and Hollie stayed in Albury supported by friends.
“We in the room at the hospital and said we have to get her out of here, we just have to,” he said.
“I went into damage control, my phone bill was $4000 for the month. I rang Australian consuls, travel insurance - everybody, every 15 minutes for three days.”
Their insurance provider eventually organised a flight for Emily to California for more major surgery.
Even then, they struggled to leave the country.
“The whole Peru experience was an arm wrestle,” Mr Wornes said.
“The Learjet was coming to pick her up and, when they were in Colombian air space, they were told to turn around or they'd get shot out of the sky.”
Emily made it to the Sharp Memorial Hospital in San Diego where she underwent 12-hour spinal surgery and separate procedures on her feet and right arm.
Her parents and new-found friend, Nick, sat by her bedside to ease her through the nightmares and pain.
On January 23, she finally boarded a plane to Melbourne and was taken to the Austin Hospital spinal unit.
She moved to the Royal Talbot Rehabilitation Centre on Tuesday.
“The neurosurgeon said he thinks she will walk again,” Mr Wornes said. “We are hoping she will for her birthday on April 1. She is going quite good, but she has some really bad days – it's just going to be a bit of a rollercoaster.
“She has been massively strong throughout the whole thing … there’s a long way to go, but there's hope.”
An online fundraiser reached almost $13,000 in four days to support Emily and partially fund a unit so friends and family could visit.
“When you're having a down day and you have a good friend walk in the door with a smile on their face, it makes all the difference,” Mr Wornes said.
Despite all that has happened, Emily and Georgia hope to tick Colombia off their bucket lists.
To help Emily, visit www.gofundme.com/5emh2kvh.
