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Crashes and casts can’t keep him down

Teen injured in ATV accident comforted by country food and hockey stars while recovering in Ottawa

KIRSTEN MURPHY

An ATV collision that nearly cost Wayne Taqtu his left foot was a hard-learned lesson in safety.

On Oct. 21, Taqtu was riding on the front of a four-wheeler loaded with teenagers in Arctic Bay. Memories of the mishap are vague, he said, but witnesses say the ATV hit a truck. The collision pinned Taqtu’s foot between the two vehicles. He was flown to Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario in Ottawa.

"I won’t do it again," he said of the hi jinx that led up to the accident. The soft-spoken teen is home after two months in hospital and is awaiting removal of his cast. He is expected to make a full recovery.

His three friends escaped the crash uninjured. But the driver of the ATV is facing charges under the ATV Act for dangerous driving and driving without a helmet.

Taqtu underwent painful surgeries and skin grafts during his two months in hospital. For most of that time, six pins were all that held his mangled foot together.

However, Taqtu, who turned 15 while in the hospital, says the ordeal had its positive moments. One was the regular arrival of char and caribou — enhancing the otherwise bland menu of hospital food.

Another highlight was his brush with stardom. Days before Taqtu’s discharge from the hospital, members of the Ottawa Senators hockey team signed autographs for patients. Though he pledges allegiance to the Toronto Maple Leafs, Taqtu was delighted to take home a hat autographed by Senators team captain Daniel Alfredsson.

"It’s hanging up in the living room," Taqtu said proudly.

Taqtu’s return to Arctic Bay on Dec. 22 was cause for celebration. "Of course we missed him, but at least he was home for Christmas," said his mother Sarah, an interpreter-clerk at Arctic Bay’s health centre.

When not at school or watching hockey on television, Taqtu throws his crutches on the back of friends’ snowmobiles and heads out on the land. The pain that initially plagued him is gone.

"I feel good, like everything is back to normal," he said.

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