A worker has been left paralysed after falling almost four metres through a fragile roof light in Lauder.
Neil Knox, from East Lothian, was apparently a time served and experienced worker, but had no formal training in roof work. At the time of the incident, he was working to replace plastic roof lights on a farm shed. He doesn’t remember how he came to fall, but was found by a colleague lying on the floor beneath a roof light that had a large hole in it.
Mr Knox was airlifted to hospital with broken ribs, a broken sternum and punctured lungs. His spine was fractured in two places, damaging his spinal cord, which has left him confined to a wheelchair with no movement or sensation in his legs. He also has only 50% lung efficiency due to partial paralysis of his chest muscles.