Freak fly-tipping accident ends with schoolgirl losing SIX fingers

A schoolgirl lost six fingers in a freak accident involving fly-tipping. Little Bella Ratcliffe, then aged eight, was playing in an alley behind her home when the incident happened.

She was making a den when she stepped on a garden table which had been dumped. Bella tried to grab on a fence to break her fall, which took of six of her fingers, reports the Manchester Evening News.

Her mum, Kerry, 34, has been left “heartbroken” after medics were unable to reattach the fingers.

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“It’s heartbreaking,” Kerry recalled. “We heard screaming and a neighbour ran over and then my son pushed me back inside and said ‘she has got no fingers’, then I collapsed.

“She was in Wythenshawe Hospital. She was in surgery for 12 hours to reattach. It did not go to plan.”

Despite Bella, now nine, ‘adapting really well’, and returning to school in what Kerry says is a ‘massive step’, the mum-of-five says she is ‘still at a loss as to what’s happened’. Since the accident, Kerry has moved her family to a different area of Salford to be closer to her family.

One day, Bella will have a prosthetic hand, Kerry added. However, the full-time-mum is now calling on the authorities to make sure the alleyway — which neighbours claim is ‘hot spot for fly-tipping’ — is secured.

“There’s a private entrance with iron gates,” Kerry said. “They told us that they had cut off the locks. Then it became a hotspot for fly tipping. The gates are always open. The neighbours said they have complained about them for years.”

Following the incident, Salford council confirmed the land is owned by ForHousing, a housing association. Its executive director of homes said that the organisation was ‘extremely sorry’ to hear about Bella’s accident.

“The security fence at the rear of the homes at Kestrel Avenue was put in place several years ago after local neighbours raised concerns about anti-social behaviour and fly-tipping in the area,” Nigel Sedman added in a statement. “In April, a neighbour reported that this incident had taken place, and we immediately visited the site to make it safe. We will continue to offer support and work with the local community.”

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