Bengaluru: On Sunday, Alexandria Ryzczak Ola, a 24-year-old Polish tourist on board the Bengaluru-Ernakulam Intercity which derailed near Anekal on Friday, took the road to recovery. Doctors saved her left leg from being amputated.
Ola, who is on a month-long tourist visit to India since Feb 2 with her husband Kamil Klebanski, 33, were on board the Bengaluru-Ernakulam inter-city express, which derailed near Anekal, 45km from here, killing nine passengers and leaving 10 others injured.
“We took a day train to reach Kochi Friday evening and celebrate the Valentine’s Day Saturday on a houseboat in the backwaters of Kerala. Though fate willed otherwise, we are lucky to have survived the accident, as we both were in the same coach that had most of the victims,” Klebnski said.
Klebnski, who was himself severely bruised, was worried about Ola’s leg as the injury was severe and feared that she may have to give up the leg for survival.
“I didn’t realise the seriousness of Ola’s injury till doctors told late Friday that they may have to amputate her left leg to prevent further bleeding and infection from spreading. I just prayed and hoped she would respond to the emergency treatment and undergo the surgery to avoid her leg being cut off,” said a now-relieved Klebnski
The couple conveyed to their relatives in Poland through their embassy about their escape from the train accident and that Ola was recovering from a severe injury.
According to the spokesman, it will take over a week for the fracture to heal and another week for Ola to fully recover from the injury and walk again.
The other injured passengers, too, are recovering. Forty-eight hours after the accident, railway officials haven’t found out whose mistake cost nine passengers their lives and a world of pain for their families.
Sources said railway safety officials are yet to crack the mystery of the boulder which the loco pilot has been quoting as the reason for the accident. However, South Western Railways say chances of a boulder being the cause are low, and repeated searches at the accident site haven’t given any clues to back the theory.
Suspicion is now veering towards the automatic brake in the control of the loco pilot, and weak links between two coaches as the reason behind the tragedy. However, talking on condition of anonymity, a railway official said there’s a strong suspicion that an ill-maintained track and train could have led to the accident.
The two loco pilots are expected to be questioned by Satish Kumar Mittal, commissioner for railway safety, Southern Circle, Bengaluru, on Tuesday.
At Sparsh Hospital, where Polish tourist Ola is undergoing treatment, a spokesperson said doctors fixed the calf-bone fracture externally through revascularization, a process in which a vein from her right thigh was grafted into the left thigh to avoid amputation.
A spokesperson for Narayana Health City said four of the six injured admitted to their hospital have been discharged and the other two were transferred to the hospital’s Whitefield and HSR Layout facilities.
(With inputs from TOI and IANS)
