War Didn’t Kill Me But Malta’s Roads Nearly Did, Says Veteran After Near-Tragic Mellieħa Accident
A soldier who served for 14 years and fought in two wars has been left critically injured after hitting a pothole in Mellieħa while motorcycling.
Wane Tabone is a Maltese/British national who served in the UK armed forces as a commando, wearing his green beret proudly for a decade and a half. He’s fought with 59 Commando Group in two wars, including the brutal front line of the Afghanistan war in 2009, and rode his motorcycle for 22 years without a hitch.
That was until he drove to Mellieħa, ending up in hospital for weeks.
“This exact part of the road is an accident blackspot, yet nothing has ever been done about it,” Tabone told Lovin Malta. Having been released from hospital days ago, he is now undergoing physiotherapy to return to his former strength after a number of surgeries following the crash.
“I am lucky to be alive. I have been riding for 22 years and never had something like this happen.”
He broke down what happened that fateful day.
“I was travelling downhill coming around the bend and it just started to rain lightly, as I started to brake a little the back wheel skidded slightly, extremely unusual at such slow speed, I released the brake and the front wheel hit one of the many deep dips on that part – and the bike just folded underneath me as the front wheel slipped away,” he recounted.
“I was literally catapulted into oncoming traffic in the other direction, hitting the wall on the other side as the bike carried on sliding down the road until it stopped eventually hitting a car.”
“I just remember landing and hearing my collar bone breaking as I skid along the ground thinking ‘I need to flip on my back to see the cars coming’ so that’s what I did before I hit the wall,” he continued. “When I stopped I checked myself over to make sure I could move my legs, opened my jacket to see if my bone was sticking through and checked for blood and then someone came and called an ambulance.”
Telgħa tas-Selmun, Mellieħa - the site of the accident
“I have so much to be thankful for and never imagine I would nearly lose my life by riding safely at a cautious speed.”
Recovering, Tabone wanted to raise awareness of what can happen on the roads, no matter who you are. He listed the number of injuries he sustained due to the crash.
“I fractured my C5 and C7 neck bones, broken four ribs and damaged my lungs and liver and have multiple breaks in my collar bone,” he said. “I cannot in good conscience let this go unnoticed through fear of someone else being seriously injured or killed.”
He urged for a greater sense of safety from authorities when maintaining Maltese roads.
“I can’t emphasise enough that this is not for personal gain but genuinely out of a deep sense of moral responsibility to my fellow man – I want to live to see my kids get old and my time is far from done, I have not been through so much in life for this to have nearly taken it all away.”
Though doctors are impressed with the speed of his recovery, Tabone can’t get over how easily he could have lost his life on a Maltese road.
“I have run across open fields holding explosives in my hands and detonators against my chest whilst being shot at; I have blown through walls and cleared building with people inside armed and wanting to kill me; I have cleared safe routes through minefields to recover the remains of my best friend after his vehicle was torn in two from a mine strike,” he said.
“Stop risking the lives of people who have already risked so much for others, repair the roads and save lives, not repair people and ignore the roads.”
What do you make of Tabone’s plea?
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