A man gravely injured in an industrial accident gave heartfelt thanks to the emergency personnel who helped to save his life.

Dwight Burcher, a maintenance worker at Fun Golf in Dockyard, was badly hurt last month after he lost control of a metal grinder and slashed open his forearm.

The 65-year-old handyman said it was the first time in his career of more than 30 years that he got seriously injured on the job.

He added: “If it wasn’t for all of them, I wouldn’t be here.”

Mr Burcher oversaw renovations at the West End mini-golf course, which involved removing a metal door in the back of the business.

He said he was sanding down a door with a large handheld grinder when he suddenly lost control of the tool.

Mr Burcher said: “Next thing I know, the saw jumps up and me and the saw are fighting.

“Everything happened to fast, I couldn’t even tell you if I had my hand on the trigger.

“All I know is that it bounced back, cut my knee, gave me a couple of scratches above the knee.

“The next thing I know, it came back and it hit my arm. That’s when it went right through the forearm.”

Mr Burcher said he feared he hit an artery or major vessel from the amount of blood that poured out.

He added: “Once I saw the blood shooting out, I knew exactly what’d happened. I knew it was something serious.”

Mr Burcher said he covered his arm as best he could and called for help.

He added that he remembered reaching the front of house by the bar before tripping and falling in and out of consciousness.

Two coworkers came to his aid, Mr Burcher said, and attempted to wake him up and patch up his wound.

He said: “Of course, I’m on the ground bleeding and freaking out and trying to remain calm because the more I freak out, the more my heart’s going to pump and the faster the blood’s going to leave.

“I was trying to stay as calm as I could, but it was almost impossible.”

Mr Burcher said emergency personnel conveyed him swiftly to hospital with “military precision”.

He added: “The ride in the ambulance all the way from Dockyard to the hospital, you could imagine what that was like. That was like a rollercoaster ride.”

A doctor confirmed Mr Burcher’s fear — the grinder blade had nicked an artery, muscle and several nerves.

Mr Burcher added that his coworkers later told him that they thought he had lost about a litre of blood.

He went into surgery and said he received at least ten stitches, though he admitted he wasn’t sure exactly how many the wound took.

Since then, he said, he has been “healing nicely” with two weeks of rest and daily light exercises to keep the muscles strong.

Mr Burcher said he has since returned to work and had some of his stitches removed.

He admitted that he still had dreams about the incident and grew tense whenever he was near the incident site or heard an ambulance.

However, he added that he did not want the accident to deter him from his interests.

Mr Burcher said: “I could retire and stay home, but then I could slip and fall down the stairs.

“I love doing this. I would’ve stopped doing this years ago if I let fear get me.”