A mum is ‘heartbroken’ after her daughter lost several fingers in a freak accident involving a fly-tip.
Kerry Ratcliffe’s daughter Bella, then aged 8, suffered the life-changing injuries in April, while playing in an alleyway behind the family home on Kestrel Avenue in Clifton, Salford. Mum Kerry, 34, says Bella was ‘making a den’ when she stepped on a garden table which she says was dumped in the ginnel.
“Bella was standing on a table, it wobbled, and her fingers came off,” Kerry told the Manchester Evening News. She added that Bella sadly lost her digits when she tried to grab onto a fence to break her fall.
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“It’s heartbreaking,” Kerry recalled. “We heard screaming and a neighbour ran over and then my son pushed me back inside and said ‘she has got no fingers’, then I collapsed.
“She was in Wythenshawe Hospital. She was in surgery for 12 hours to reattach. It did not go to plan.”
Despite Bella, now 9, ‘adapting really well’, and returning to school in what Kerry says is a ‘massive step’, the mum-of-five says she is ‘still at a loss as to what’s happened’. Since the accident, Kerry has moved her family to Winton, also in Salford, to be closer to her family.
One day, Bella will have a prosthetic hand, Kerry added. However, the full-time-mum is now calling on the authorities to make sure the alleyway — which neighbours claim is ‘hot spot for fly-tipping’ — is secured.
“There’s a private entrance with iron gates,” Kerry said. “They told us that they had cut off the locks. Then it became a hotspot for fly tipping.
“The gates are always open. The neighbours said they have complained about them for years.”
Following the incident, Salford council confirmed the land is owned by ForHousing, a housing association. Its executive director of homes said that the organisation was ‘extremely sorry’ to hear about Bella’s accident.
“The security fence at the rear of the homes at Kestrel Avenue was put in place several years ago after local neighbours raised concerns about anti-social behaviour and fly-tipping in the area,” Nigel Sedman added in a statement. “In April, a neighbour reported that this incident had taken place, and we immediately visited the site to check it was safe. We will continue to offer support and work with the local community.”
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