A woman who held the hand of a biker at the roadside after he came off his bike in a horror A82 crash has spoken of her attempts to comfort him.
Lesley Borland was first on the scene when the 56-year-old crashed near Fort William on Saturday afternoon. He died after rescue attempts failed at the scene.
The 32-year-old mum-of-three said she did everything she could to help him maintain consciousness and took off his leather gloves to hold his hand.
He was not scared
She said: “I kept telling him to sit still, don’t move. He didn’t look scared, he was calm. He was just looking at me the whole time while I talked to him and held his hand.”
Ms Borland was making her way home to Glasgow from Fort William with her partner and their twin four-year-old sons when the incident happened on Saturday afternoon on the A82 at Achintore Road, Fort William.
She sprang out of the car to see if he was all right.
She went on: “His friend was with him, he was also on a motorbike, he was coming behind him when it happened. I think he went into shock. I gave the guy in the next car my phone to dial 999 and I went over and sat with him and I spoke to him.
“He had leather gloves on so we took them off and I just held his hand. I was just talking to him, I was saying ‘stay awake, stay with us’, he was just looking at me, listening to me talking. He didn’t seem to be in any pain, he was calm, he wasn’t suffering.
“I held his hand until I lost his grip and then the ambulance came and they did everything they could.”
Not alone
She added: “I just want more than anything to let his family know he wasn’t alone, that he had someone next to him comforting him.”
Asked how she was coming to terms with such a disturbing situation, the young mum said it was still sinking in.
“I’m still in shock,” she said. “I don’t think it will hit me for a couple of days. I’m still in shock mode.”
The 56-year-old biker was taken to the local Belford Hospital but died of his injuries.
Police have appealed for witnesses to the road crash which involved a white Triumph Tiger motorcycle and a grey Audi S3 car.