Well, it didn't feel much like Autumn until recently, but with a few dark, cold mornings and the light fading around 5pm it's feeling more and more like the closing months of the year. The good news is that ladder related crime and thefts are starting to fall, but given the unseasonably good weather we have had up until now, there are still a few thefts and injuries to report.

Falls from Ladders

We start with the ladder related injuries, this time in Australia. Father of two Adam Clarke was working on his home, renovating the garage area, when he fell from the top few rungs of the ladder he was using.  Mr Clarke, from Victoria, suffered a broken wrist and lacerated ear, as well as serious breathing difficulties from breaking eight ribs. Two weeks after the accident Mr Clarke is still struggling to breathe and talk normally. Luckily his two daughters were under the care of a babysitter at the time, to whom Clarke was able to call out for help. The emergency doctor at the Alfred Hospital urged fathers, especially those over 50, to think twice about using ladders. Associate Professor Mitra sees the most ladder related falls from men in their twenties and men aged between 50 and 65.  He sees mostly trade accidents from the younger group and the older group tend to be injured while working at home, but with more serious consequences. Perhaps if you know someone who fits this risky category you can suggest some ladder safety training to them, as it is all too easy to slip and seriously injure yourself. It was a man in his 50s that needed the assistance of the air ambulance when he fell from a ladder onto concrete.  The man had been around 15 feet off the ground and suffered serious chest injuries, for which he received treatment at the scene as well as in hospital. The air ambulance also attended in East Anglia when a man in his early 60s sustained a head injury after falling from a ladder. Although the man cannot remember what happened, and there were no witnesses, he was believed to have been using a ladder before his wife found him wandering in their house in a confused state.  In Winchester a 42-year-old woman was also taken to hospital after having an accident on a ladder at her home. She had been cleaning a roof window when the ladder she was using slipped on the flat roof of the ground floor extension, which had a gravel surface. Her husband, who was indoors, heard her scream and called an ambulance. Gravel is not a good surface on which to base a ladder, as the small stones can move a lot and even the tiniest movement can cause the ladder to become unstable. In Falmouth, Devon, a fisherman fell from a ladder and into a boat, breaking an ankle, tearing the ligaments in his calf muscle and hurting his back. He could have been more badly injured though, as he narrowly missed landing on an anchor and fell more than 25 feet in total.  Despite his badly injured ankle, Mr Smith was able to climb back up the ladder to the quayside, almost collapsing when he returned to his van and inspected the state of his ankle. Luckily, Mr Smith was about to go fishing with his wife when he fell, so she was able to help him when he made it back up the ladder, although she was also very shocked to have seen her husband plummet so far down.

Take Care with Metal Ladders

We see a lot of reports of people getting electrocuted when using metal ladder: two men in Pinellas, County, Florida, were mildly shocked when the ladders they were moving made contact with an overhead power line.  Perhaps because of their footwear or the fact that there were two of them holding the ladder they did not receive a more dangerous shock, but they are lucky to be relatively unscathed.  They are certainly luckier than the firefighters in Campbellsville, Kentucky, who received a bad electric shock, but more on that later. As the tree trimmers from Florida found out, it pays to be aware of your surroundings and any potential hazards from any direction.  Sadly, a window cleaner in Poole is wishing he had taken extra precautions to guard the base of his ladder, after a pensioner on a mobility scooter knocked the bottom of it sending him crashing to the floor.  The man suffered serious head injuries after falling fifteen feet, although the pensioner was unhurt.  Police are investigating how the accident came about.  Ladders can even be harmful to road users, as two people discovered recently.  In Cleveland, Ohio, a ladder had come loose from a vehicle on the interstate (I-43) and caused a 53-year-old female driver to crash into the central barrier after she struck the ladder, which was lying in the middle of the carriageway.  The lane was closed for half an hour to recover the ladder, and take the woman to hospital. On I-95 in Philadelphia a police officer was badly injured when he was thrown from his police motorcycle after crashing into the vehicle in front.  The vehicle had slammed on the brakes, as had the cars in front of it, after a ladder fell from a truck and onto the road.  The officer, who was on his way to a funeral home to pay respect to another officer, was thrown into the air, onto a vehicle, and then into the road where he was nearly hit by another car.  He sustained injuries to his jaw, shoulder, hip and face but was released from hospital later the same evening.  The Philadelphia Police Force is investigating who the ladder belonged to and how it came to be in the road. A London based painter and decorator is lucky to be alive after falling from a ladder at work and getting his head stuck between the rungs as he hit the ground.  45-year-old Andrew Rees was taken to King's College Hospital following the accident, where surgeons worked for ten hours to rebuild his skull, which had been so badly damaged that fourteen metal plates and 94 screws were installed to hold it together.  To look at Mr Rees now, you would not be able to tell that he has all that metalwork in his head, as surgeons were able to operate through incisions on his mouth, scalp, under his eyes and next to his ears.  Thanks to the skilful work of the operating team he has no major scarring, despite having x-rays that prove just how much metal is holding his head together. In another case of medical marvels, 19-year-old William Binns, an apprentice plumber, owes his life to a fall from a ladder.  Following an accident at work he was thought to have broken his ankle.  When the pain had not subsided after several weeks he was x-rayed again. This second x-ray showed a tumour 8 centimetres long near his fibula, and nodules were also discovered on his lungs.  Mr Binns had his leg amputated to stop the spread of the cancer, diagnosed as Ewing's Sarcoma, and is currently undergoing a long course of chemotherapy to treat the remaining tumours.  Without the fall from the ladder, who knows whether the cancer would have been detected in time? In part two we will see some of the stories from around the globe that have not had such a good outcome.