Surfer, 66, has thigh lacerated by board fin in wipeout

Susanna Freymark

Pam Love has been surfing for a long time.

She loves the challenge and the people she surfs with who are like family. And she loves the feeling of being part of the ocean wave.

Pam has lived in Evans Head since 1997. Her partner died three years ago.

At 66, she feels comfortable out in the ocean.

“Surfing is my life,” she said.

On Wednesday, March 13, Pam was surfing with six friends at Snapper Rocks at Evans Head. One of those friends was a paramedic.

The swell was “pretty big” that day, Pam said.

“I took off on a big wave.”

All of a sudden, Pam was caught up in a big wipeout.

“I got tangled up with the board. The board was thrashing and I was tumbled about.”

As she was being tumbled in the huge wave, she felt a cut on her thigh and a stinging on her back near her left kidney.

When she surfaced, she saw that her surfboard had a fin missing.

She saw too the deep laceration on the top of her thigh.

She sat on the beach, and her friends including the paramedic used a towel to stem the flow of blood.

“I felt sick,” Pam said. “My thigh was gaping.”

A young American surfer raced through the back track to the car park to get a phone and dial triple zero.

“When he got to the car park he grabbed his emergency kit,” Pam said.

The kit had a proper bandage.

Four surfers, taking turns, carried Pam more than halfway over the sand dunes of the Snapper and Chinaman Beach headland before meeting the emergency crew with their equipment. 

The ambulance and SES arrived but couldn’t get the cars down to the beach. Instead the SES had a contraption with a large wheel suited to the sandy conditions and put Pam into it.

She was taken to Lismore Base Hospital and had immediate surgery on her thigh.

“I was lucky it didn’t hit an artery.”

She had a nasty bruise on her back too.

Pam is back home and grateful for the help she received.

She is likely to make a full recovery she’ll be in the surf again as soon as she can.

“At 66, I’m going to be more discerning,” she said.

Nothing will keep her out of the water, but she may choose days when the swell and waves are a good ride for her and her surfing buddies.