‘Relieved, and happy to be alive’: Hans finally home after horrific cruise fall

Adelaide cabaret star Matt Gilbertson says a good friend helped save his life – and how staff in Turkish hospital repeatedly turned off his oxygen to save money.

It should have been the trip of a lifetime for Matt Gilbertson, the Adelaide entertainer we all know – and love – as Hans.

Instead the cruise through the idyllic Greek Islands ended with a terrifying fall, a frantic rush to a Turkish hospital and serious injuries to his spine and right foot.

Now the Boy Wonder from Berlin is finally, eight weeks after the accident, safely back in his western suburbs home.

He says he has been overwhelmed by the love and support he has received from fans around the world throughout the ordeal – from video messages from German supermodel Heidi Klum and a phone call from South Australian premier Peter Malinauskas to thousands of messages his legions of followers who reached out through social media.

And he is effusive in his praise of good friend Associate Professor Adam Montagu, a nurse and experienced health professional who through a stroke of incredible good fortune was accompanying Gilbertson on the trip. Last cruise Gilbertson took his hairdresser Atilio.

Matt Gilbertson aka Hans during his show 'Hans at the Symph-honey' at the Thebarton Theatre. Picture: Naomi Jellicoe

THE ACCIDENT

“The accident happened on the 25th of August,” Gilbertson recalls.

“The day before we were in Mykonos, and the day after – the 25th – we were off Bodrum in Turkey. I was rehearsing all day. I was meant to do two shows. The first one was at 7.30 and we got almost to the end … well. Let’s just say I didn’t see Turkey at all. I saw the roof of the ambulance, the roof of the hospital, the roof of the ambulance again and then the airport.”

The stage Gilbertson was working on aboard the Atlantis Events gay cruise on Royal Caribbean’s ship Odyssey of the Sea was fitted with three hydraulic lifts that could raise and lower sections of the floor as needed.

“Basically one of them was down when it was meant to be up,” he says.

I was told the fall was between three-and-a-half and four metres. During the performance I was singing in the audience, then came back on stage and then … yeah.”

The fall fractured five vertebrae in Gilbertson’s back, as well as his coccyx, and shattered several bones in his right foot.

Stunned, it took the entertainer a moment to realise just how bad he’d hurt himself.

“Apparently I started trying to crawl back on to the stage,” he says.

“I was just freaked out. I knew my back was sore, and I knew something had happened to my foot. I thought it was just a broken foot, whatever that means.”

In a scene Gilbertson describes as “quite chaotic” he was rushed to the ship’s medical centre, accompanied by no less than three doctors who happened to be in the audience that night.

“They put me on the spinal board,” he says.

“I was worried about my foot, but they were more worried about my spine, which I guess you need to be.”

It was when Gilbertson realised that the captain was turning around the ship – and all 6000 people on board – to head for the port of Bodrum that he realised things might be more serious than he thought.

TO HOSPITAL

Clapped off the boat by hundreds of cruising wellwishers, Gilbertson and was transferred to an ambulance and taken to the Bodrum American Hospital.

With nothing by paracetamol and ice for his pain and forced to communicate with the nurses through a translation app on his phone, Gilbertson says the presence of Montagu was the one thing that gave him hope everything would be OK.

“The only reason Adam was there was because he come with me on a trip to Coober Pedy,” he says.

“I said, ‘Honey, if you’re willing to come to Coober Pedy then you can come with me to Mykonos. Thank God I did. That first night in Turkey was really not good.”

Montagu made contact with medical colleagues in Australia, sending through scans for second opinions, as well as working the phones to inform Gilbertson’s travel insurance agency.

(In another stroke of remarkable good fortune, the entertainer had remembered in the airport that he’d forgotten to arrange cover, so quickly sorted it out before taking off.)

“Adam was staying in the room with me, changing my sheets, helping me go to the toilet,” Gilbertson says.

“He had even brought his own oxygen monitor in case he’d gotten Covid and he was begging them to put my on oxygen because he could see my levels were falling.

“They’d put me on oxygen, then they’d turn it off and the levels would fall again. I don’t know why that was happening.

“Every time I asked for anything in the Turkish hospital the response was always ‘we have to check with finance first’.

Matt Gilbertson in London with his physiotherapist Caroline Murphy.

Gilbertson with his doctor Luckshmana “Lucky” Jeyaseelan. Picture Facebook

After a gruelling week in the Turkish hospital, the pair finally got word that a plane was on its way to take Gilbertson to London – only to then be told that it had experienced mechanical issues and had been forced to turn around.

The next day Gilbertson and his guardian angel finally touched down in the British capital, where and ambulance was waiting to transport him to London Bridge Hospital.

It was there, in the care of high-level specialists and a nursing team he describes as “amazing” that he finally felt relaxed and safe for the first time since the accident.

“It was just such a relief to be there,” Gilbertson says. “I felt very, very grateful to be staying there.”

Orthopaedic surgeon Luckshmana “Lucky” Jeyaseelan was given the task of repairing Gilbertson’s shattered foot, inserting four metal plates and “about 20” screws over more than four hours to hold the broken bones in place.

“Apparently, as I was on the gas and going under, I said, ‘Oi, Lucky, don’t f … this up,” Gilbertson recalls.

THE RECOVERY

While recovering in his ward Gilbertson received visits from many high-profile friends he’s made through his work on television.

Sunrise hosts David Koch and Natalie Barr (in London to visit their favourite Hans, and perhaps to cover the funeral of Queen Elizabeth if they had time) dropped in, as did Channel 10 entertainment reporter Angela Bishop.

Channel 10 entertainment reporter Angela Bishop with Matt Gilbertson in London Bridge Hospital. Picture: Supplied

“I had no idea Angela was coming,” Gilbertson says.

“I looked like trash, and she’s so glamorous. While she’s there I look to the left and there’s a full bottle of urine just sitting there.”

Luckily Gilbertson’s back looks like it will make a full recovery, although he’s still in a brace. The foot, though, will be a more long-term prospect and the entertainer admits it will probably be some time before he’s back treading the boards.

He’s adamant, though, that he will get back to doing what he was born to do.

“I’d love to do a show tomorrow, but I’m not allowed to rush it,” he says.

“The timing is a bit annoying. Things were coming back after Covid, I had enough gigs that I could leave my other job and concentrate exclusively on performing. This was my second gig after going full time.

“So it all has a while to go, but I feel very relieved to be back here.

“Relieved, and happy to be alive. It’s not an experience I’d ever want to repeat.”