A Tasmanian emergency dispatcher has been internationally recognised this week for his part in saving the life of a 69-year-old Kings Meadows man who accidentally took a mechanical saw to his own leg last year.
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Garry Beven - a retired 20-year veteran of the The Royal Corps of Australian Electrical and Mechanical Engineers - was clearing trees and stumps at his Kings Meadows home in preparation for some new flower beds when disaster struck.
Mr Beven was bent over using a circular saw attachment on his angle grinder to help remove stumps when he noticed the electrical cable was getting a little too close to the sawblade.
"I went to get the cord out the way and it [the circular saw] kic
ked in, hit me in the leg and didn't release," he said.
According to Mr Beven, he knew straight away that he was in trouble when blood began to gush from the deep wound. He staggered 30 metres to his house and tried to patch the wound but it was too deep and he couldn't stem the blood flow.
Luckily, Mr Beven's daughter Kristy Craig called triple zero and was patched through to dispatcher Lewis Stadler. In a calm voice, Mr Stadler walked Ms Craig through the process of fashioning a tourniquet. Using a stick, Ms Craig tightened the tourniquet just above the gushing wound until the blood - which was quickly filling up a Coles supermarket shopping bag at Mr Beven's feet - stopped flowing.
All in all, Mr Beven believes he lost about 1.7 litres of blood. When the ambulance crew arrived, Mr Beven was only semi-conscious and the crew struggled to administer intravenous fluids because his veins "wouldn't stand up".
Now back on his feet and fully recovered - save for a long scar on his right calf - Mr Beven knows that if it wasn't for Mr Stadler, things could have gone very differently.
"If it wasn't for his words of encouragement and his actions, I wouldn't be here today," he said.
Following the event, Mr Stadler has now been named the 2021 Australasian Dispatcher of the Year, which is awarded by the International Academies of Emergency Dispatch. Mr Stadler said he was humbled by the honour but considered it more of a team award for the incredible colleagues he works with.
"The paramedic who went out to the job told me that, more or less, the tourniquet had worked really well and saved the man's life,'' he said.
"It's the unfortunate fact that it's a job where you don't get to win every single day. To get a win in a situation like that is always great."
Speaking on Mr Stadler's efforts, Ambulance Tasmania chief executive Joe Acker said he was "enormously proud".
"There can be no greater recognition of the contribution to the safety of every Tasmanian who finds themselves facing the worst day of their lives and calling triple zero,'' Mr Acker said.
Almost a year after the event that almost took his life, Mr Beven said he's looking forward to one day buying Mr Stadler - who is based in Hobart - a beer and thanking him.
"But what do you say to someone who saved your life?" he added.
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