A 21-year-old man has survived a harrowing fall of approximately 40 metres from a bridge onto the Tejina ring road in La Laguna, Tenerife. The incident happened yesterday afternoon (Monday) at around 3:25pm, when a local resident witnessed someone jumping from one of the bridges on the Tejina ring road.
The Emergency Services Coordination Centre (CECOES) received several reports of the incident and promptly dispatched the necessary resources to the location given.
Two police motorcycles escorted an ambulance through the traffic to the scene, and upon arrival, they were shown by the people present the exact spot where the man had landed at the bottom of the ravine. Immediately, officers cordoned off the area in anticipation of the imminent arrival of the rest of the activated resources, including the fire brigade.
Accessing the spot where the man had landed was difficult due to the terrain, so a ladder on a fire engine was used to assist firefighters in reaching the bottom of the ravine. While initially presumed dead, when one of the firefighters descended to the location of the body, to his and everyone's astonishment, the man was alive. Due to this the rescue efforts intensified, with a fully equipped advanced life support ambulance waiting at the top to treat the man.
According to the Canary Islands Local Police Blog, the man is a 21-year-old resident of El Portezuelo who had, allegedly, jumped to commit suicide landing in a cluster of thick bushes, which seemingly cushioned his fall and saved his life. Despite sustaining severe injuries and fractures, the young man remained conscious throughout the ordeal.
He is currently in hospital with 24-hour surveillance to assess his physical and mental condition in the hope he can fully recover from the ordeal.
