'This can happen to you too', warns young woman injured in road crash

RTÉ News​

6 days ago

A two-day Safer Roads conference is taking place in Killarney, Co Kerry, drawing on experts from across Europe in the areas of road design, engineering, policing, enforcement, technology and education.
The conference will explore how artificial intelligence, and analysis of road collision trends and statistics can be used to improve road safety.
Almost 300 delegates and speakers, including a young woman who was badly injured in a road collision nine years ago, will attend the event.
Paschal Sheehy spoke to the 20-year-old about the impact of the crash on her life.
Méabh White has just finished her second year of pharmacy studies, almost a decade after she suffered severe injuries in a car collision.
She is 20, going on 21.
She is studying at the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin, and is looking forward to a bit of free time over the summer.
At least some of that time will be spent with her family in Co Roscommon - with her mum, Clodagh, and younger brother and sister, Rían and Sadhbh.
A decade is a long time in the life of a young person and almost ten years ago Méabh's life was changed forever, in a matter of seconds.
On 9 July 2016, Méabh was on her way to a birthday party.
Her mum was driving with Méabh in the front passenger seat and Rían in the back of the car in a rear-facing child seat.
At a crossroads half a kilometre from their home in Kilteevan, Co Roscommon, they were involved in a collision with another vehicle and their Renault Scenic was propelled through a 2m wall into a field.
Méabh suffered the most severe injuries.
She had a cracked skull and intercranial haemorrhages, a fractured C1 vertebra in her neck, and she broke her back and pelvis.
Méabh was transferred by helicopter to University Hospital Galway and from there to Temple Street Children's Hospital in Dublin.
She spent three days on life support and a week-and-a-half in intensive care.
When she finally woke up, Méabh was on a spinal board, staring at the ceiling.
Her mum was still in hospital in Co Galway, being treated for serious, but non-life-threatening injuries.
Rían escaped serious physical injury. His rear-facing car seat - fitted only four days before - probably saved his life.
Méabh was watched over during this time by her grandmother, Teresa, in St Gabriel's Ward in Temple Street.
"I just remember saying to her, 'is this all I'm going to be able to see - the ceiling, am I ever going to be able to see anything else again?'," she said.
At that time, Méabh was under the care of consultant neurosurgeon, Muhammad Sattar. He told her there was no medical reason to explain why she woke up.
'This kind of stuff can happen to you'
Méabh said it was a year or so before she started to return to herself. Initially, she used a wheelchair as she had to learn to walk again.
Then, there were the mental scars that had to heal, that took time too.
Today, Méabh is looking forward to enjoying the coming summer with her family. She embraces life with both arms.
And, when she has time in her busy schedule, she addresses road safety.
"I do it because there are so many teenage road deaths, so many young people dying on our roads," Méabh said.
She said: "They think they are titanium, they don't understand that this kind of stuff can happen to you, even if you aren't in the wrong.
"I was 12. I had my entire teenage years permeated with pain, permeated with the legal aftermath of the crash, the trauma, the physical injuries.
"I felt I was living two separate lives, because obviously I was a teenager and there is so much to being a teenager without that on the side."
Méabh is due to attend the two-day Safer Roads conference in Killarney, Co Kerry, that is being held today and tomorrow.
The conference is not open to the public. Instead, it is drawing on experts from across Europe in the areas of road design, engineering, policing, enforcement, technology and education.
The conference will explore how artificial intelligence, and analysis of road collision trends and statistics can be used to improve road safety.
Almost 300 delegates and speakers are attending the event, which is being hosted by Kerry County Council.
"Road safety is not just about the road or the vehicle but also about how technology, human behaviour, enforcement and education intersect to reduce risks and prevent accidents," Kerry County Council's Road Safety Officer Declan Keogh said.
"Every branch of the road safety tree is represented and our main aim is to improve road safety for every road user," he added.