Royal hoax DJ Mel Greig returns to radio for first time since Jacintha Saldanha took her own life

DJ Mel Greig has returned to a radio studio for the first time since the on-air prank which prompted a distressed hospital nurse to take her own life.

Channel 7's Today Tonight interview of DJs Michael Christian and Mel Greig.

RADIO DJ Mel Greig has returned to a studio mic for the first time to talk about her life since a prank in which she posed as the Queen prompted a distressed hospital nurse in London to take her own life.

“I feel quite sick to be perfectly honest … this is quite overwhelming,” Ms Greig emotionally told BBC2 Radio listeners in the UK as the host crossed to her sitting in the studio.

She revealed she had just realised she hadn’t been in a studio since December 2012 when a radio hoax had gone horribly wrong.

Ms Greig was hosting on 2 Day FM then with fellow DJ Michael Christian when they posed as the Queen and Prince Charles and rang the London hospital where the real life Duchess of Cambridge was suffering severe morning sickness with her first child.

Taking the rap ... Michael Christian and Mel Greig interviewed on Channel Seven’s Today Tonight shortly after the incident.

Nurse Jacintha Saldanha who answered the phone and put the call through to the ward took her own life two days later and cited the distress at being fooled as one of the reasons.

Ms Greig spoke at length yesterday about the experience post the death and how she felt “the world hated me”.

During the interview Ms Greig was forced to listen back to part of the original broadcast and then took calls from listeners most of which were sympathetic although one said it was “disgraceful” the BBC should give her airtime to defend herself.

She said she did try to alter the hoax call and dub over the nurses voices and it was never her idea to do the prank in the first place but she felt disgust with herself when she heard the nurse had taken her life.

At the inquest ... Mel Greig at Royal Courts of Justice in London. Picture: Ella Pellegrini

“I was in disgust with myself, I had failed as a human being, to be involved in someone’s death is horrific and it affected me greatly,” she said, adding such was her state her family and she herself feared she would take her own life.

She said she was mentioned in the nurse’s suicide note so she felt totally accountable.

“You feel you’ve failed as a human being to know someone has thought of you as they take their own life; I do know there is more to mental health now, that it’s not normally an event like that that can trigger someone to commit suicide but at the time I believed it and felt completely at blame and guilt.”

She said her life had changed forever and she had been in a deep depression for 12 months.

She said she was at peace with it now but she would be forever known as the royal hoax DJ and that may hamper her hope to return permanently to radio work. She said her co-host Christian saw things more black and white and felt he was not the cause of Jacintha’s death and moved on but she initially couldn’t.

Prank victim ... Nurse Jacintha Saldanha. Picture: AP Photo/Saldanha Family

When she was asked whether 2 Day FM, owned by Southern Cross Austereo, protected her or “hung you out to dry” after the incident to she paused then retorted “well I mean what do you think?” The surprised host of the midday program said he had thought they were initially but didn’t know.

“They were really concerned for my safety and my wellbeing which was good, providing a psychologist straight away straight away, I mean we were in lock down for three months and I had constant security guards, bodyguards, we had bullets sent to police stations with our names on it we had so many active death threats,” she said before she recounted verbatim some of the death threat messages she had received from people in Britain.

She said she always felt for the family but was not in contact with them although she spoke through the inquest to them to say sorry. She said she realised she was now ready to return to radio after being behind the microphone during her engagement party.