Dunoon man Paul Shipway remains critical after horror crash

A retired bus driver and his partner had it all before them, but that changed in a split tragic second after a crash near Lismore left him fighting for his life. This is his story.

Dunoon couple Nadine Ebb with her partner Paul Shipway, who is now fighting for his life after a road crash in Dunoon village Thursday, November 3, 2022. Picture: Supplied

Nadine Ebb admits she has a lot of ‘history’. A schoolteacher working in the relaxed township of Nimbin, she met her beau, Paul Shipway, at a bush regeneration hangi three years ago.

Sparks instantly flew.

“We had a bit of a whirlwind romance,” Ms Ebb said, “both of us were in our late 40s when we met.

“We both had history and we both connected over the hangi actually (laughs).”

The couple were preparing to create a large market garden where Mr Shipway could grow food for the family and the community.

“We found a few properties that we were really interested in, and we ended up landing 76 acres in Dunoon,” Ms Ebb said.

A retired bus driver, Mr Shipway has been working the new property and securing water for it.

The best made plans unravelled in a blink on Thursday, November 3, when emergency services were called to James Street, Dunoon, north of Lismore, about 4.30pm after reports a Subaru Forrester and a Kawasaki motorcycle had collided.

Ms Ebb said Mr Shipway had been on the property with his teenage son, Harry, 17, doing bush regenerating that day.

“We had a couple’s counselling session because Paul has three children and I have two and as you would know, blended families are really tricky,” Ms Ebb said.

“Harry has just got his motorcycle licence, his Ls. They both worked together that morning on the property then rode together up to Clunes.

“Then they split because Harry was going to work in Lismore and Paul was going to the counselling session in Bangalow.”

The couple had been successfully working through their family issues and had left Bangalow on a good note.

They agreed to make for home, so Mr Shipway left on his motorcycle while Ms Ebb drove back to their Dunoon property.

When Paul didn’t come home

“I was waiting at home for him,” Ms Ebb said.

Minutes morphed into larger chunks of missing time, yet Mr Shipway had not made it home.

“I was countering my fear with ‘oh no, he’s just found someone to talk to’ because Paul loves to chat,” she said.

“Or maybe he’s gone to the shop, and he’s dropped in to see Russell who’s the mechanic there in Dunoon.

“I was coming up with all these reasons why he was running late.”

When Mr Shipway failed to answer phone calls and text messages, Ms Ebb went out looking for him.

She drove down the single lane gravel road being hypervigilant to take the sharp hilly bends cautiously in case Mr Shipway was just around a corner.

Dunoon man Paul Shipway has been transferred to the Princess Alexandria Hospital in Brisbane. Picture: Supplied

“Every bend I went over he wasn’t there, and I thought ‘oh, this is bad’,” she said.

“Maybe he is a bit further along, so I turned into James Street which is the main street in Dunoon, and that’s when I came across the accident.”

Ms Ebb vaguely remembers seeing her partner’s bike and ‘stuff’ strewn across the road.

“By the time I got there, there were three ambulances,” she said, “a fourth one arrived later, and the Westpac Rescue Helicopter was just arriving,” she said.

“I couldn’t think. I can’t even remember; I just remember being in shock.

“A police officer said it was him, and they had him on a stretcher.”

Mr Shipway was wearing full protective clothing - leather jacket, Kevlar pants, gloves and a $600 helmet that Ms Ebb credits with saving his life.

“He hardly had a scratch on him,” she said.

Two nurses who saw the accident performed CPR on Mr Shipway while waiting for paramedics.

“I’m really lucky for those two beautiful nurses, Paul has survived as a result of their effort because they performed 17 minutes of CPR,” Ms Ebb said.

“He has cracked ribs as a result of it, which means it was really good CPR.”

Police have charged a 26-year-old man with dangerous driving occasioning grievous bodily harm, drive manner dangerous, drive with low range PCA, negligent driving – occasions grievous bodily harm, make U-turn without giving way to vehicle/pedestrian, and possess prohibited drug.

The damage was done

“Paul has broken his C3 and C4 vertebrae – they’re shattered,” Ms Ebb said.

“He has had a prosthetic put in place of his spine.

“He has a fractured thoracic spine, he has three broken ribs, and a fractured cheekbone which is giving him trouble with his sinus.

“Paul has no movement on the right side of his body. He has little movement on the left.”

After being flown to the Gold Coast University Hospital in an induced coma, Mr Shipway had a CAT scan and an MRI.

Family called to his bedside

Doctors told Ms Ebb to gather family.

“They didn‘t know if he was going to survive,” she said.

“I reached out to Jade, his middle daughter, and Carol, his mum.”

Mr Shipway’s two sisters, Corina and Ange, his parents, son Harry, daughters Jade and Brittany along with Mr Shipway’s ex-wife Joanne travelled to the Gold Coast University Hospital.

“Everyone gathered that first day on the Friday at the Gold Coast,” Ms Ebb said.

“Then they moved him to the Princess Alexandria Hospital in Brisbane where they have the best spinal team in Queensland.”

Surgeons performed a six-and-a-half-hour anterior corpectomy on Saturday, November 5.

“They did an anterior corpectomy anterior incision in his throat, the corpectomy from the front which is what that prosthetic is, will protect Paul’s spinal cord,” Ms Ebb said.

“It’s bruised internally. It still has some flow though, which they’re really pleased about.”

Doctors are monitoring Mr Shipway who remains in 24-hour intensive care.

Dunoon man Paul Shipway is fighting for his life. Picture: Supplied

Now they are focused on improving Mr Shipway’s breathing.

“Because he can’t feel in the right side of his body including his lungs, they aren’t working,” Ms Ebb said.

“I‘ve only learned this since this accident, we have two lobes of lung on the left side of our body and that’s to accommodate our heart.

“On the right side we have three lobes of lung, so his left side is working overtime to try to compensate. Paul had an event at the scene, and they’re concerned he breathed in the contents of his stomach.

“As a result of that, they’re treating him for pneumonia as well. So, he’s coughing up a lot of sputum at the moment, mucus, blood and sputum.

“He is in a very bad way. So, he does the coughing part. Very, very difficult, with great difficulty. And then the nurse has to suction that from his mouth.”

Physiotherapists are also tracking soft tissue and ligament damage.

“They have to splint his hands, so the tendons stay lengthened. They have to splint his right foot, so that the achilles stays taut otherwise it would be another level of injury that they would have to manage,” Ms Ebb said.

Long road to recovery

She said the only person willing to give her any time frames for Mr Shipway’s recovery has been a social worker.

“She is saying that once he can sustain himself and he doesn‘t need 24-hour care then he’ll be moved from ICU down to the orthopaedic ward,” Ms Ebb said.

“Then he’s waiting for a bed in the spinal unit. And that could take months.

“Once he’s in the spinal unit, it’ll be months and months of physiotherapy and trying to get as much movement back as he can.”

Ms Ebb has rented an apartment opposite the hospital to be close to Mr Shipway.

“I’m staying up here for about a month,” she said.

Ms Ebb is waiting for her doctor to call her for a medical certificate to get time off work.

“I haven’t organised any of that yet,” she said.

Dunoon couple Nadine Ebb with her partner Paul Shipway, who is now fighting for his life after a road crash in Dunoon village Thursday, November 3, 2022. Picture: Supplied

The family wishes to promote safe riding and driving.

“So many motorcyclists end up like this because drivers don’t look. They cause catastrophic injury to those who really doesn’t deserve it,” she said.

“I‘m not going to veer away from our dream because we keep saying that this is just a speed hump at the moment, and we’re right in the middle of it.”

The family has set up a GoFundMe for Mr Shipway’s recovery.