By NOEL MURPHY
MAN versus electricity rarely has a happy outcome, as the scars on Brett Coleman can attest.
The Geelong anaesthetist came to the pointy end of this painful equation when he rode his mountain bike into a fallen high-voltage line at Anglesea last year.
Fourteen months later, minus half an ear and with scars across 20 per cent of his body, Dr Coleman’s back in the saddle and counting his blessings.
He can’t forget the months of painful rehab or the shock his young family suffered but counts as bonuses the support he received, the extra friends he made and the new sports pursuits he discovered as a result of his accident.
“My major burns were to my left ear, a large part of my upper back, wrists, fingers, both upper legs and the sole of my left foot,” Dr Coleman said.
“I was lucky I was clicked into my pedals when I hit the line because the electricity channelled out through the cleat on my left foot.
“Exit wounds are usually large blast wounds and I’d have likely lost my foot had it been on the ground. Instead, I had a deep but relatively small burn on my sole.”
Dr Coleman has no recollection of January 27, 2013, when he rode into the 12,700-volt line hanging head-high across a bush track near Eumerella Scout Camp.
Found lying on the ground more than an hour later, he was airlifted to The Alfred hospital where he woke 18 hours later.
“There had been a fire on the wooden cross-arm holding the line. This caused the line, still attached to the insulator, to fall to the ground.”
Dr Coleman was out of action for the next three months but was back at work as an anaesthetist and ran a half-marathon later in the year.
He took up mountain bike riding, joined Surfcoast Trail Group and now classifies himself a “true MTB geek”.
A few months ago he rode through the area where he was injured competing in a Surfcoast 100K.
“I felt like giving the power pole the bird as I came past it on the last lap,” he said.
“But I was too tired and might have fallen off.”
