- When Tammy Davis, 52, started her morning with a DIY renovation, she never expected her hubby John to end up in the ICU.
- Falling off a ladder, John was impaled by a plumbers pipe sticking out of the ground.
- Incredibly, the 1.5cm wide pipe narrowly missed all his veins, arteries and vital organs.
Here Tammy tells her story in her own words.
Soaking in the morning sun, coffee in hand, I looked over at my husband, John, then 45.
‘Ready to work?’ I asked.
‘Ready when you are,’ he replied, smiling.
It was November 2025, and we’d planned to renovate our basement after floodwaters destroyed it in July the year before.
Over the years, John and I had become DIY pros.
‘Ready when you are.’
From remodelling bedrooms, kitchens and bathrooms, we could do it all.
Now, our children, Christine, 26, JC, 24, and Nicholas, 20, had moved out and we were ready to tackle some more projects.
After gutting our flooded basement, today’s mission was to mount tin sheet onto the plasterboard so it would protect the walls and could be easily removed in the event of another flood.
But first, we had to retrieve the materials from our open-ended shed.
Setting up a 2-metre A-frame ladder on the leaf-covered dirt floor, John climbed up to the second-top step to reach the tin stored in the rafters.
Trying to get a better grip, John took a step towards a lower rung, when the ground suddenly gave way and the ladder disappeared from underneath him.
Standing around four metres away there was no time for me to react as the ladder fell left, while John plummeted towards the ground on the right, screaming.
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Crashing on the dirt floor, he put out his right elbow to cushion the fall.
When I reached him, John was lying dead still, perched up on his right forearm, shock written across his face.
He was conscious but ghostly pale.
‘Are you okay?’ I panicked.
‘It’s in me,’ John croaked.
What I saw made my knees buckle.
‘You’re shaking more than I am.’
A length of metal pipe had impaled him under his right upper ribcage, and had pushed through his chest all the way to the left side of his neck.
Somehow, the pole hadn’t broken through the skin, but it was close enough to make my tummy turn.
My heart raced as I knelt beside him and dialled emergency services.
‘You’re shaking more than I am,’ John soothed.
‘Send everybody you can,’ I begged the dispatcher.
Next, I called my brother and sister-in-law who lived around the corner.
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‘I need you,’ I cried.
Waiting for someone to arrive, I felt utterly helpless.
I was too scared to move John, afraid one wrong touch would stop him breathing.
All I could do was watch his chest rise and fall and wait for the sirens.
My brother and sister-in-law arrived first, and waited out the front to help guide the ambulance toward the property.
When paramedics arrived 30 minutes later, I stepped aside while they administered pain relief, cut John free and rolled him onto a gurney.
‘I need you.’
To prevent him from bleeding out, they’d left the length of pipe, around 60cm long, inside him.
Thankfully, when it had entered his body, it’d pushed his shirt inside with it, essentially plugging the wound.
As his injury was worse than the local hospital was equipped for, paramedics called for a helicopter transfer, which landed on the property soon after.
With limited space on board, I stayed behind to pack overnight bags.
‘I love you,’ I said, giving John one last kiss.
Shortly afterwards, my brother, sister-in-law and I followed behind in the car.
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By the time we arrived, John was already in surgery where doctors removed the pipe, cleaned his wound, and repaired a puncture in his right lung.
After four agonising hours, relief washed over me as John was moved to recovery.
Incredibly, the 1.5cm wide pipe had narrowly missed all his veins, arteries and vital organs.
He’d also broken seven ribs during the fall.
‘It really is a miracle,’ one surgeon confirmed. ‘An inch left or right and it could have been fatal,’ he added.
‘You had me so worried. Thank God you’re okay,’ I said, holding John’s hand.
‘It really is a miracle.’
After 24 hours in ICU, John was moved to the trauma unit, before being released seven days later.
To help the wound heal, doctors left the wound open but carefully bandaged it up.
Thankfully, my daughter Christine who works as a nurse, visited each afternoon to clean and re-pack it with fresh gauze.
And when I went back to work as a forklift driver two weeks later, our German shepherd cross labrador, Hudson, and chihuahua, Harley, kept John company.
We’d never noticed the metal pipe before but looking back at photos, it was definitely sticking up out of the ground.
We’ve since had it properly removed and have put the renovations on hold while we focus on John’s recovery.
Now, three months on, John is still recovering.
Healing slowly but surely, John is off all pain medications, his wound has completely healed and he is set to start working with a physical therapist to rebuild his strength.
While he hasn’t had clearance to return to work as a forklift driver, he’s happy to be back on his feet and moving around on his own.
It’s hard to believe a DIY project landed my hubby in the ICU, but I’m so thankful and grateful he lived to tell the tale.
