A British teenager is fighting for her life in intensive care after a paraglider crash-landed on her during a family lunch in Turkey.
Lily Nichol, 15, from Durham, was having her final meal of the holiday with her mother and sister at a restaurant in Fethiye when the freak accident occurred.
The incident happened as the family was due to fly back to Newcastle – but the teenager has been unable to return home, and is stuck with severe injuries at a Turkish hospital.
Lily’s mother, Lyndsey Logan, said: “I just remember Lily eating, biting into a slice of pizza and this paraglider just came from nowhere and just totally wiped her out over the table.”
Lily Nichol has been left fighting for her life in intensive care after a paraglider crash-landed on her during a family lunch
GOFUNDME
“She face-planted the table and we tried to get her up.
“Obviously she was unconscious and she had a stroke while she was down. I thought she was dead,” Ms Logan told The Sun.
The teenager was immediately rendered unconscious, with her mother screaming for an ambulance while desperately trying to keep her daughter responsive.
Nichol has suffered extensive injuries, including a bleed on the brain, broken jaw, broken ribs and a possible broken back.
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She remains in intensive care at Letoon Hospital in Fethiye
Doctors also found that her tongue had been split in half during the impact.
She remains in intensive care at Letoon Hospital, where she is scheduled to undergo further operations.
The family, who travelled without insurance, now face mounting hospital bills of £7,000 for the first day of treatment alone, with costs expected to rise further.
Their additional expenses include hotel accommodation and daily taxi fares to and from the hospital.
Despite travelling without insurance, the family’s crowd-funding drive has raised thousands of pounds
GOFUNDME
Despite travelling without insurance, the family’s crowd-funding drive has already received support from more than 600 donors, raising over £9,000 of their £45,000 goal.
“Stupid me forgot to take out holiday insurance,” Logan wrote on GoFundMe .
“I’m a desperate mam. I can’t lose my little girl… I just want to get her home.”
Logan has also hit out at Turkish authorities, saying: “Not one policeman has been to see me.
“I rang them and said I need the police here – I said the man who’s hurt my daughter, put her in hospital is in my hotel.”
She claimed the police hung up on her during the call.
“I just never want to go on holiday again, I don’t think. I just want to wrap her round in cotton wool,” she added.
A Foreign Office spokesman confirmed it was “providing support to a British girl and her family following an accident in Turkey”.