By KATH GANNAWAY
A BELGRAVE woman trapped in her bed when a huge tree fell on her home in the early hours of this morning managed to get a call out to triple zero.
The woman was trapped for two and a half hours as CFA and SES volunteers and paramedics worked to release her.
Emergency services, including an air ambulance, were called to the 66-year-old woman’s Old Reservoir Road home just before 4am.
Paramedic team manager David Gray said paramedics were faced with a number of challenges with no power, a significant-sized tree to work their way through, and the woman pinned somewhere in the house.
Belgrave CFA captain Phil Keep described the rescue as “delicate” and praised the woman’s bravery through the ordeal.
“We had to make sure there was no possible risk of the structure crashing in, so it was about what’s the tree going to do, is it going to move, it wasn’t the sort of thing we could rush through,” he said.
He said the rescue involved chain-sawing through some of the branches to get access and then propping up the tree.
“She was very brave, it would have been a daunting thing for her,” he said.
Paramedics worked with the woman as the rescue was underway.
“The woman was able to talk but it was difficult to assess her injuries until the tree was removed,” Mr Gray said, adding she was lucky in one respect.
“Just a few inches one way and the tree could have landed on her head and it would’ve been a disastrous outcome,” he said.
The woman was taken by road ambulance to The Alfred hospital in a stable condition with head, hip and leg injuries.
Specialist CFA structure collapse teams from Boronia and Dandenong was called in and CFA units from Belgrave, Belgrave South, Upwey and Monbulk attended, along with Emerald SES.
