Bomb-blast heroine honoured

A female Army medic whose legs were riddled with shrapnel from a bomb blast has been honoured for refusing to leave wounded comrades, despite her injuries.

Lance Corporal Hayley Ridgeway, 24, of Syerston, near Newark, received a Mention in Dispatches on Friday, with the citation describing her as “simply outstanding.”

She was screaming with pain by the time she was ordered to leave her post.

Hayley, of the Royal Army Medical Corps attached to 1 Rifles, was part of a team heading out on patrol on August 12.

Just 150 yards out of their base a bomb was triggered.

Seven of the patrol, including Hayley, were injured by ball bearings in the device.

Hayley’s left leg bore the brunt of the blast with a bearing lodging in her knee. Another passed through her right ankle.

The patrol leader, Lieutenant Dan Clack, also 24, was badly injured with bearings in his neck.

Despite the risk of ambush, Hayley started tending to the casualties using her infantry medic’s kit.

The wounded were taken back to the command post on a quad bike.

Hayley refused treatment herself for 51/2 hours as she stabilised the casualties and oversaw their evacuation to the hospital at Camp Bastion.

Her mother, Mrs Jill Ragless, said: “She tended to the men throughout.

“Lieutenant Clack sadly died at Bastion Hospital. The doctors told Hayley they couldn’t understand how she kept him alive for so long when they couldn’t have done it at the hospital.

“I don’t think she realised how injured she was. She tried to run to the quad bike but her legs wouldn’t work.

“She was screaming with pain herself by the time she was ordered out and that is the only reason she left.

“I am bursting with pride. She is a hero, as are all of them.”

Mrs Ragless and her husband, Bryan, were told their daughter had been injured on August 12, their wedding anniversary.

“Like so many others we are wary of men in suits coming to the door,” said Mrs Ragless. “It took two minutes for them to confirm who I was and say she wasn’t dead but in those two minutes, in my head, she was dead to me.

“I was told she had been quite badly wounded in an explosion and you just wonder how many limbs they have left.

“Then came the relief and then the guilt because her boss had died.”

Hayley, a former pupil at Toot Hill School, Bingham, is to be promoted to corporal and can return to active service once she is fully recovered.

Her brother, Dean, 20, has completed his infantry training and is due to deploy to Afghanistan with the Royal Anglians for his first tour of duty.