A bell-ringer who was hoisted in the air before crashing to the ground after catching his foot in a bell rope has described the moment he found himself being flipped upside down.
Ian Bowman was visiting Worcester Cathedral on Saturday evening accompanied by 20 other campanologists when he suffered the freak accident that left him with a fractured bone in his back.
The 51-year-old said the incident took place in a matter of seconds when he was hoisted a couple of feet in the air before hitting the marble floor of the belltower of 13th-century place of worship.
He was eventually winched down 80ft from the bell tower to the church floor on a spinal board by firefighters who had to open several trapdoors and use a rope system during the Evensong service. He was taken to Worcestershire royal hospital where he was treated for a cut to his head and back pain.
A mechanic by profession, Bowman is still able to walk and speaking from his home in Widecombe-in-the-Moor, Devon, he said: “We were raising the tenor bell, which takes two people, and the rope caught my heel.
