Back from the brink

‘I heard the crunch’

HANNA VICKERY admits she’s had “a few misses, but this was the worst”. A year ago, as her mare backed off before a fence, she gave her a squeeze.

“With that, she was up and over on top of me,” says Hanna. “I just remember the crunch I heard.”

Later in hospital, Hanna discovered she had broken her pelvis in five places and her right humerus in half. She had a six-hour operation to pin her pelvis, insert a metal pelvic fixator and a plate in her arm, and spent Christmas and New Year in Southampton University Hospital.

Hanna didn’t ride again until after the metal fixator was removed in May, yet in June she was at her first show.

“I still have nerve damage and ache doing certain things, but I don’t care —