Teenager in vegetative state after backflip off pier goes wrong
A 15-year-old boy has been left in a vegetative state after doing a “show-off” backflip off a pier while on his first trip to a beach without his parents.
Jack Dolan landed on his head after jumping off Stone Pier in Margate, Kent, on June 23.
His parents Lisa Dolan, 33, and Dave Dolan, 35, are now fundraising so they can move house and make the necessary alterations in order to look after him at home.
Their son requires round-the-clock care and doctors are unsure how long he will survive.
Speaking about the incident, Mr Dolan said: “I think he misjudged it and landed face first on the water and knocked himself out.
“It was only three or four metres and if he’d landed a quarter rotation one way or the other he would probably have been fine.
“That’s why we can’t be angry at him. He’d done it so many times before, there is no blame.
“I know he was laughing, I can actually see him doing it, smiling and being a complete show-off.”
He added: “The last thing he would have known was being happy.”
It was their child’s first trip to the beach without them as he has ADHD.
Mr Dolan, who lives in Rainham, Kent, said: “It was the first time we’d let him. We’d always said no because we were quite strict. He had ADHD and he acts before he thinks.
“But he was 15 and we wanted to give him a bit more freedom.”
Jack, a pupil at The Howard School in Medway, was with a group of friends and his girlfriend when the accident occurred.
It is thought he did not realise the height of the pier or the depth of the water when he jumped in.
He is understood to have been knocked unconscious upon impact before his friends pulled him from the water.
After Jack’s friends called emergency services and his parents, he was taken to King’s College Hospital, London, by air ambulance.
An MRI scan later revealed the teenager had suffered severe brain damage.
End of life care
Doctors said he may live for just weeks - but conceded that he could survive for years.
Mr Dolan said: “He’s on end of life care and while his body is OK, his brain is dead.
“He can’t go to a children’s hospice because you have to be close to death. He’s off life support and breathing, but doing nothing else.
“His eyes flutter sometimes but he’s asleep most of the time. We want to take him home, but we live in a maisonette and we can’t have him here.”
A person in a vegetative state is alive, can breathe unaided and there is a slim chance of recovery. Brain death is when a person is being kept alive artificially and there is no chance of recovery.
The family, including Jack’s sisters Faith, 10, and Grace, eight, are in council accommodation and are raising money for home alterations at a new property.
Mr Dolan said: “We need two reception rooms, a downstairs closet and a wet room.”
Around £12,000 has been raised out of a target of £20,000.
Sam Cass, who organised the crowdfunder for Jack, described him as “the biggest joker, with a heart of gold”.
He added: “He loves to show off in front of girls and won’t leave the house without doing his hair.
“He loves his family, will do anything for his sisters and this fundraiser is to take a little bit of the burden away from them.
“Many people love Jack and I’m sure they all wish the family wasn’t going through this right now.”
