Samantha Kinghorn: BBC Countryfile presenter recalls accident that left her fearing she would die

Speaking to OK!, she explained that she grew up in a farm in Scotland with her parents, Neil and Elaine and her brother. She recalled a day when the farm had been hit by heavy snowfall, Kinghorn had been with a friend when she noticed her dad in his forklift, “beeping his horn and laughing” and that on impulse, she decided to climb on.

Unfortunately, her dad, Neil, didn’t realise his daughter had climbed on the farm machinery and lowered the forklift bucket which he had been using to clear the snow from the farm, onto his daughter.

Kinghorn told OK: “I remember feeling this pressure on my neck. I started to laugh; I thought Dad was joking, that he'd gone a bit too far. Then I started screaming. I felt my back popping and before I knew it my head was in my crotch. I was crushed right down into a tiny ball.”

She continued: “My heart was thumping in my chest. Everything felt really slow and all I could hear was my breath. I remember closing my eyes and thinking ‘you're going to die, and your Dad's going to think it's his fault’.”

She revealed that after opening her eyes, she could feel her legs "pulsing" and "twitching”, but after that never felt them move again. She spent six months in a specialist spinal unit in a Glasgow hospital and recalled the “awe” of using a wheelchair for the first time.

Kinghorn initially told doctors she had slipped, not wanting her dad to blame himself, before revealing what had really happened. Describing the experience, her father Neil, who said he had taught the dangers of farm machinery to his children, said he felt “numb”, and that the accident, “blew our life to pieces.” However, the double Paralympic medallist and a world champion wheelchair racer, explained she felt her injuries were a “consequence” for her “doing something silly”. Following on from that accident as a teen, Kinghorn holds the world record for the T53 1500m. She is a presenter on BBC Countryfile, has received an MBE and in 2023 got engaged to her partner Callum.

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