Australian Shane Watts has crashed while setting up for a Dirt Wise Riding School in Warrensburg, Missouri, and suffered serious injuries. His website has been updated with his current condition. Obvioulsy he will not be part of the Australian team for this weekends ISDE.
From his website
Shane has 3 fractured vertebrae, a fragment of bone seems to have pushed into his spinal column. Three broken ribs and a very sore neck. The great news is that he is able to move his legs and we are hopeful that he will heal completely. Doctors says he won't ever get back on a bike again, but he doesn't know how stubborn these bike guys are! Thats what the doc said the first time he broke his back, and see, he was totally wrong. Needless to say, we will not be going to the ISDE on Monday as planned, but will likely remain in the hospital here in Kansas City for some time.
Watts' website said today, "Good news and bad news...good news: it doesn't appear as though they will do surgery on his spine, but we will have to be very careful about his movement. One stumble and things could go from bad to worse. Bad news: waiting on another chest x-ray and CT scan-possible collapsed lung. All things considered we are okay...but the patience is wearing thin. He has done really great managing the pain and has only had morphine once today. Hoping the news this afternoon will be good. If there is a situation with his lung, he won't be able to fly home because of air pressure, so then we have the catch-22 of driving 20 hours and the problems that could cause with his back. Guess we will cross that bridge when we get there! Let's just hope we don't get there!
"Thanks to everyone for all the prayers and kind words, to KTMhutt and Thumpertalk for the flowers and balloons, to Dan and Terry and Brad for the quick thinking and level headedness in getting Shane to the Hospital, and to Jeff for getting us squared away at the hospital and offering his home and car! The kindness of everyone has made Shane and I both get a little teary eyed at times (although he won't admit it)."
To keep up to date check in at
www.shanewatts.com:
We here at Fullnoise wish him a speedy recovery.
