On November 28, 2016, Alex Partington’s life changed forever.
Returning home from a normal day at school, he went with a mate down the bush behind Ellison Road to tackle some jumps on his mountain bike (instead of his bmx) trying a jump he hadn’t done before.
“I landed wrong and realised I couldn’t move, as if I was getting sucked to the ground,” he told a Springwood Rotary meeting recently. “My mate went to get help … I thought I was going to die.”
He had broken his C3-4 vertebrae causing a spinal cord injury. What has followed has been a lot of surgery, sickness, rehabilitation, seven and a half months in hospital and the threat of never walking again. But there’s also been highlights like sit-skiing in Thredbo and wheelchair rugby, and he is starting to walk again unassisted.
And then last week the 17-year-old Winmalee High school student was the first to try out the wheelchair accessible carousel at Springwood’s Buttenshaw Park.
Alex said there were activities in parks for toddlers in chairs, but parks generally didn’t cater for anyone older in a chair.
The carousel was funded by Springwood Rotary and Variety the Children’s Charity (NSW). It is supported by Blue Mountains Council, which will now maintain it.
Deputy Mayor, Cr Chris Van der Kley, said “the younger generation will really enjoy it and especially disabled people”.
The carousel and installation cost $36,000.