Swakop’s Kücki talks about his lucky escape

EVEN though he insisted on standing the first 30 minutes after his plane crash on February 3 on the Windhoek Golf Course, well-known Swakopmund restaurant owner and business personality Wolfgang ‘Kücki’ Kühhirt cannot recall any of what happened on that day that nearly cost him his life.

When he regained consciousness from an induced coma three weeks later in the Medi-Clinic intensive care init, he though he was at some missile base where a rocket had misfired. All the buildings seemed to be pink, and strange people were addressing him, Kühhirt recalled.
‘The mind plays strange tricks on you… like it filters what is happening to you, creating a consciousness without you being aware of it,’ he said in an interview two months later in his Windhoek apartment where he was recovering from the crash on take-off from Eros Airport.
Of the accident itself, he recalls nothing but what witnesses subsequently told him: Claude Thorburn, playing bowls at the Windhoek Country club, was the first to the scene of the accident.
After first dragging Rostock Ritz employee Aron Jeremia out of the plane, Thorburn had to break off the plane’s steering stick to get to Kühhirt as fuel was pouring from the destroyed aircraft’s tanks.
Off all this, Kühhirt remembers nothing – his recollections are based entirely on what he was told afterwards. He had refused to sit or lie down (‘I think I must have had breathing problems because of the broken ribs’) and eventually had to be strapped down standing upright before being sedated to allow medics to start draining his collapsing left lung.
Eyewitnesses generally agree that the ultra-light Jabiru 400 appeared to have hit a tree on the golf course just beyond the southern end of the airstrip as Kühhirt attempted an emergency landing after losing altitude shortly after take-off on runway 19.
Eros airport’s reputation as one of the most dangerous in the region – set at hot and high altitude with high, surrounding hills that cause dangerous downdrafts – is well known to him as a pilot of 30 years’ experience, Kühhirt said.
Although the accident report has not been finalised yet, Kühhirt said the fact that the engine ran again in post-accident testing indicated to him that he must have cut power for a controlled emergency landing when at altitude of about 30 feet.
In those critical seconds, the aircraft’s left wing appeared to have clipped a tree as it came down, smashing Kühhirt into the left corner of the cockpit. Most of the impact was borne by his left shoulder: the shoulder joint was smashed and nine out of 12 left ribs were smashed (and three on the right), causing his left lung to eventually collapse.
Today, he is still regaining the full use of his left hand, as the nerves through this joint were severely damaged in the process. His right wrist also suffered multiple fractures, but he was fortunate that his head only sustained relatively minor lacerations.
The fact that he kept standing upright and that his ribcage did not contract as strongly as that of a younger person was what ultimately prevented him dying of his collapsing left lung, Kühhirt’s doctor. Dr Basie Steyn, told him afterwards.
Dr Steyn had kept Kühhirt in an induced coma until he was sure his patient was out of danger. After three weeks in the ICU, he was moved to the high care section for another three weeks before moving to his Windhoek apartment to recover.
What he now needed to fully recover, Kühhirt decided, was the clear desert air – and he moved back to the farm this past weekend. His biggest problem is going to be to keep his pet zebra away from him: she is fond of jumping up and ‘hugging’ him, Kühhirt said.
What helped his recovery immensely so far was the enormous amount of well-wishing – thousands of people he could never reply to all individually – and so-called ‘distance healing’ administered by spiritual healer friends of his.
‘I know, it’s what you believe in and this is not for everyone, but there was lots of positive energy coming at me. I really believe it is what has helped me to where I am now,’ Kühhirt said.
‘I’m extremely grateful for everyone who contacted me, sent good wishes, and especially to Dr Steyn and the ICU staff.’
Aron Jeremia got off considerably lighter: he broke his right arm in two places, and after excellent medical attention, will be back at work soon.
As for ‘Kücki’, it will be light duties for a while – but he expressed his heartfelt gratitude to his staff who had kept the Rostock Ritz running smoothly in his absence.
johngrob@iway.na
* John Grobler is a freelance journalist