Independent Newspapers
ALIVE: Clinton Naidoo was hit in the face by a piece of steel that burst through his car window while he was driving on the N2 South near Chesterville on Wednesday. He does not know where the object came from. Pictures: Siyanda Mayeza and Rescue Care.
A Durban motorist was hit in the face by a steel object that smashed his windscreen when he was driving on the N2 South near Chesterville on Wednesday.
A colleague, who was in the car with him, was able to control the car by grabbing the steering wheel as Clinton Naidoo sat stunned and bleeding.
Paramedics who arrived on the scene stopped the bleeding and took him to hospital.
Naidoo had a deep cut, a cracked jaw and a broken nose. Doctors said his sunglasses saved his eye.
In an interview with The Star’s sister paper, The Mercury, from his home in Phoenix yesterday,
Naidoo said he was about to take the Queensburgh off-ramp when something struck him on the left side of his face.
“My new colleague (known only as Jonathan) was on his first day at work and I was showing him around,” he said.
DAZED
Naidoo said he was dazed and couldn’t see the road, but Jonathan grabbed the wheel and safely pulled the car into the emergency lane.
When they stopped, he said, Jonathan flagged down a tow truck, which directed traffic and phoned the paramedics.
Rescue Care’s Garrith Jamieson said:
“He had sustained serious facial injuries.”
Naidoo said paramedics gave him morphine for the pain.
He was taken to eThekwini Heart Hospital, where he was placed on a drip and his face was stitched. He was discharged later that night.
“The whole thing happened so quickly. I didn’t even bother to look if someone had thrown the object,” Naidoo said, clutching his wife Janelle for support.
Naidoo said his colleague saved his life because he would have crashed had he been alone.
Janelle, who rushed to the hospital, said she was thankful her husband was alive.
Last year, the eThekwini Municipality said cameras would be installed on bridges to catch those throwing objects at motorists. -The Mercury
