Taunton Window Cleaner Impaled On Railing

Jon Richardson recovering at home - with the offending spike.

Taunton window cleaner impaled on railings after falling off ladder: Window cleaner Jon Richardson is nursing a sore foot after falling off a ladder and becoming impaled on railings. But without his quick reactions he reckons the accident would have been far worse.

“I fell 2½ metres and was going down stomach-first with the spikes coming towards me,” said Jon, aged 40. “But I got my foot out just in time, otherwise I’d have had four spikes through my tummy and wouldn’t be here today.”

Jon was on the top rung and about to start cleaning an upstairs window in Grove Gate, Staplegrove, shortly before 10am on Saturday when the ladder slid from underneath him. After he landed on the railings, with his body on the ground, Jon at first thought he’d simply trapped his ankle. “I called for help and people came running out,” said Jon, of Trendle Road, Taunton, who will be off work for six weeks. “They lifted my body up level with my feet, which is when I saw the spike had gone through my foot.”

Firefighters cut him free with the spike still embedded in his foot, while ambulance staff administered pain relief. He was then taken to Musgrove Park Hospital, where a doctor removed the spike and he later underwent surgery to remove debris from inside his leg. Jon, a window cleaner for 20 years, who lives with his partner and has two grown-up children, said: “My family were horrified when they heard I’d been impaled on a spike. “But it could have been far worse if I hadn’t realised what was going on and moved my foot in the way.”