For the second time in 54-years, Liston Aberdeen has suffered a life-altering injury, this time losing his right arm, from the elbow, when a container truck slammed into his car on Wednesday.
In 1983, when he was only 20-years-old, Aberdeen became completely blind in the right eye following an accident.
And while the grandfather of two was hesitant to rehash the circumstances of his previous injury, he recounted the moments leading up to his latest accident at the San Fernando General Hospital yesterday.
He said he was headed to his Rock Road, Penal home around 4.30 pm when the accident took place.
“I was driving east along the Penal Rock Road when the other driver swerved to avoid hitting a pothole and hit my car instead,” he said.
“I was off for the day and had gone to pick up my wife from her workplace on Penal Junction. She said she had to work late, so I was going back home when it happened.”
He said his hand was not hanging out of the car window as some media houses reported but his right elbow was on the door.
“My elbow was on the door and when he slammed into me, it just get cut off.”
Doctors at the hospital were unable to reattach the limb, as Aberdeen said it was ‘left outside’ for too long.
“They took me to Siparia (Health Facility) and the hand was still in Rock Road. When they send the hand to Sando, I was still in Siparia, so too much time had passed for them to put it back on.”
His arm was swaddled in bandages yesterday. He said it had been badly mangled by the accident.
Still under heavy sedation for his pain, Aberdeen said he was unsure how he would move forward as he was right-handed.
Aberdeen is a security officer employed with the Ministry of Health.
“It will be very difficult to live like this, I don’t know if I will be able to do anything for myself...I don’t know how I am going to live with this.”
He said he has not heard anything from the police yet and no one has taken any statements from him since the incident.
The T&T Guardian contacted the Penal Police Station but was told that no information could be released on the accident.