Would the team from Times of Malta be so kind as to tell us who did this?
Published:
August 11, 2014 at 1:21pm
I am sure they will agree that what this car-owner did was far more serious than crashing into a parked car with nobody inside it. It would make a great story to splash over two-thirds of the front page: PARKED CAR COSTS STATE THOUSANDS IN FOILED TRIP – Patient flown back to base as car-owner claims not to know he blocked the helipad
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http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2014-08-11/news/helicopter-with-sick-person-made-to-return-to-gozo-because-of-illegally-parked-car-at-st-lukes-6164250624/
The cost of the foiled trip from Malta to Gozo to Malta to Gozo and back to Malta where the ‘copter is based, is double the cost of the Malta to Gozo to Malta to transfer Justyne to MIA to catch that vital flight to Marseilles.
If the car owner who left the car on the helipad happens to be ‘tal-qalba’, surely he will receive no more than a fine for illegally parking his vehicle. The ‘disciplinary action’ will amount to no more than, say, thirty euros.
And why, according to reports elsewhere could ‘the car not be immediately removed’?
This car-owner should be side-stepped and asked to explain his actions. His actions are criminal too.
We were not told why the patient had to be flown to Malta, was it an emergency? This would make this man’s actions even more serious.
door-stepped (side-step means to avoid)
The person who parked his car there must be a Malta Enterprise Taghna Lkoll untouchable.
The building adjacent to the St Luke’s Hospital helipad is the Malta Enterprise office which is now headed by Labour stalwart Mario Vella.
I wonder if the arrogant owner who parked his vehicle on or very near to the helicopter pad was one of the recent Malta Taghna Lkoll appointments. The helicopter pad is sealed off and is only accessible to the top management of the Malta Enterprise.
Although the blame rests fully on whoever parked the car there I think it is also utterly irresponsible and/or incompetent of whoever is in charge that they did not just push or pull the car out of the way to allow the helicopter to land. The helicopter could have just orbited a couple of minutes rather than going all the way back to Gozo.
It cannot take more than a few minutes to forcibly move a car. If one happens to have a short length of rope it can even be done with no damage to the car, if one were to be concerned about that.
Unless of course the car belonged to some untouchable and nobody had the courage to touch it.
Seems that the team of Times of Malta are quite in Mr. ‘Kasko’s ‘ pocket. If not then it seems that Times of Malta has got quite a bunch of amateurs for journalists.
The car should be confiscated and crushed, and the owner should be billed (for the crushing) and fined and have his licence suspended.
You’re sounding negative! Joey doesn’t like you.
That rather misses the point, doesn’t it? The problem was not the car, but that it was parked in the wrong place.
And please add to your proposed heading to the story “Patient died”
http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2014-08-11/news/patient-in-helicopter-saga-dead-but-was-in-a-bad-state-already-6169985025/
Tomorrow
It would be very ironic if the culprit was a Gozitan tal-qalba.
The patient, who had suffered a stroke, subsequently died on Sunday .. maybe not as a direct result of the delay, but I’m sure it didn’t help.
Why aren’t they using the helipad at Mater Dei Hospital?
They never have regularly. Through the years both governments came up with colorful excuses but the real reason is poor location. Even the lightest of winds is deflected by the neighboring buildings into swirls and eddies (imagine a river flowing around stones) which often makes landing hazardous.
Where are those towing trucks from a few years ago?
Surely, a case like this would have demanded the immediate confiscation of the car and a fine running into the thousands. Guess what, try doing that in a hospital anywhere in Europe and see what happens.
The sick person being flown to Malta has died because of the irresponsibility of that idiot who parked the car on the helipad illegally. I hope that he/she and the relevant authorities are sued. How on earth can someone say that an illegally parked car cannot be removed from its place? Couldn’t they tow it away? What is happening on this silly island?
This incident is significant in its own right. I would ask why the AFM helicopter was not diverted to AFM Luqa where it could have boarded the MDH medical team without any problem.
This is protocol after all, say, in cases of bad weather when the helipad cannot be used. It takes around 13 minutes to get to Luqa from St Luke’s in an ambulance with a siren on.
As usual, official Ministry communication is ambiguous or misleading at best. This incident, in reality, reflects the level of mediocrity and amateurism that permeates across health Ministry senior leadership.
The purge is now complete, with all competent leaders since removed or made to resign, replaced with lacking Taghna Lkollers some unqualified and all inexperienced.
The result of the Mizzi-Fearne purge is a series of blunders, more than people know about.
But more about this some other time. Alas, the opposition is totally ineffective in its criticism, with the PN spokesman for health more interested in pursuing silly and self gratifying initiatives.
There is probably more to the ‘helipad’ story because the devil is in the detail. What is certain is that under Labour anything goes.
Actually he was a PN supporter being vindictive, as usual.
This case is exceptional and current enough to merit the front and back pages of Times of Malta.
Surely someone can provide the number plate of the car involved. The arrogant idiot who parked his car on the helipad should be named, shamed, and fined heavily.
Please do not a accept any bull that ‘the patient would have died anyway’. If that was certain, why was he booked for transfer.
A patient is never transferred to Malta to die, is he. Logic, ethics and proper use of health resources tell you that a patient is only transferred if the place he is to be transferred to is deemed able to give some sort of advantage to the patient.
Otherwise why risk the lives of everyone on the flight, the chopper and spend the money for fuel etc. while making end of life so much more traumatic for the patient and family. Being transferred into a vehicle then chopper and another vehicle is not exactly what we see on Grey’s you know, risks multiply.
If the Ministry of health states that patients who will not benefit at all are still transferred to Malta then we should all accuse them of misusing our taxes and putting crew lives at risk unnecessarily.
There are innumerable ways to issue statements about this without really giving useful information. Was this a thrombolitic stroke or a haemorrhagic stroke. What intervention, all of which are time sensitive, was planned or where there still more investigations to be done in Malta. Is an MRI available in Gozo for example?
Heads should roll but they are firmly attached to bodies with a huge sense of entitlement. Many people’s middle name has become ‘gode l’immunità’.
The mystery surrounding the name and occupation of the car owner involved in this very serious abuse (that could have killed helicopter transferred patients) speaks volumes.
These magisterial and internal departmental investigations are assuming the character of unfunny jokes, exercises in whitewashing and sweeping the dirt under the carpet.