A former ambulance orderly man praised for his role in offering assistance to a critically injured Canadian guest worker after a road accident on September 17 has said it was lucky that he was at the scene at all.

Nakia Lekki had been heading for St. George’s when he realised he’d left something behind in Hamilton and went back to fetch it. As a result he came across the accident on North Shore Road in the Clay Town area of Hamilton Parish that fateful Sunday evening.

The 28-year-old Canadian crash victim suffered serious head injuries and a broken leg after a head-on collision between his rental motorbike and a car near the junction with Winton Hill Lane.

He has since been airlifted off the Island after being in the Intensive Care Unit at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital.

Mr. Lekki, who now works for The Royal Gazette Ltd.<$>, has CPR training and medical experience from his time as an ambulance orderly and took control of the situation as residents gathered to offer help. As reported in the September 19 edition of The Royal Gazette, Crown Communications managing editor Rebecca Zuill was one of those at the scene who praised the calm and cool way in which Mr. Lekki handled the incident.

“I saw the traffic was blocked and there was this guy on the phone who asked if anyone knew CPR. I told him I had done some training,” explained Mr. Lekki.

“I spoke on the phone to the hospital and told them that he (the injured rider) was not breathing and his face was lying in a pool of blood. The hospital said we had to move him to allow him to breathe.”

Mr. Lekki asked for a board to be brought out and together with five men at the scene rolled the injured man onto his back on the board.

“We turned him over and he immediately took a big gasp of breath and began breathing again.”

The mother of the injured man indicated she wants to personally thank Mr. Lekki for the assistance he gave at the scene of the accident.