A boyfriend described the horror moment he saw his girlfriend fall 80 feet off a waterfall.
Cara Sutton, from Aigburth, and her boyfriend James decided to visit Coed-y-Brenin forest in Snowdonia National Park, North Wales in August last year, shortly after the 26-year-old had recovered from covid.
The pharmacist, who works at Alder Hey Children's Hospital, slipped on one of the rocks to her knees five metres away from the edge and slowly started to slide towards the drop.
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Cara said she remembers clinging onto some moss as she desperately tried to pull herself up.
Her boyfriend James told the Mirror how he reached out to Cara before the horrifying moment he saw her drop of the edge while calling his name.
James said: “I was nearly within reach when Cara dropped off the edge whilst calling out to me.
"I made the split-second decision to not follow her and dug my fingernails into the rock and grabbed some vegetation to the side of the cliff.
"I scrambled and managed not to go over the edge.
"I shouted for help three times at the top of my lungs and started sprinting back down the path.
"I believed there was no way she could’ve survived a fall from that height and expected the worst.
“When we got to the hospital they didn’t mix their words, they told us she was lucky to be alive.
“It’s an absolute miracle that she was still wearing her helmet or we don’t know how things could have turned out.”
James rushed to get help and found someone who happened to be a doctor who assessed the 26-year-old and kept her calm.
Cara said: “I didn’t even scream as I fell and I can’t remember hitting the ground. James was thinking the worst had happened and had run to get help.
"Fortunately for me there was a doctor nearby with her family, so they all found another route down to me.
"She began assessing me and kept me calm. People gave me their coats to keep warm.”
Cara lay in the ravine for around four hours before being winched to safety by the mountain rescue team and was taken to the major trauma centre at Royal Stoke Hospital.
At Royal Stoke doctors found she had broken her pelvis, ribs and sternum.
She also had a fractured spine and vertebrae and had a collapsed lung.
Cara had to have several emergency surgeries to fix her spine and damaged organs and spent over two months in hospital learning how to walk again.
With her family, friends, and colleagues from Alder Hey rallying around her, brave Cara was even walking in time for her brother, Jacob, to visit at Christmas from Australia.
She was discharged on November 9 last year, two and a half months after being admitted, and is now doing regular physio at home to regain her strength.
Cara's accident will now feature on the third episode of the latest series of 999: Critical Condition on Thursday, January 20.
The documentary, which is filmed exclusively at the Royal Stoke, charts the life and death decisions and actions of staff and this week includes the case of Cara together with a victim of a high speed car crash and a patient with a fast growing tumour.
Cara was initially treated by trauma consultants Dr Hari and Dr Richard Fawcett who were concerned about the extent of her injuries.
In the programme, Dr Fawcett says: “This is a fatal fall, there’s lots of rocks and boulders, so really hard landing and that is a height that can kill someone.
"If the patient is not dead by the time the emergency services get there you have really got to worry that this patient has multiple things wrong with them.”
Thankfully Cara is making a recovery and said: “I’m generally pretty well considering what I’ve been through and the other day I managed to walk 10k.
"It’s absolutely amazing how well they were able to put me back together again. The trauma doctor was so calming and reassuring and I knew I was in good hands. I definitely could have died but they saved my life.
“Now I just want to get back to what I was doing. Things like bike riding and walking - but not up cliffs. Just being outside, having adventures and getting back to work.”
