Ross Saultry and wife Christine Ponting are battered and bruised after they were involved in a motorbike accident on a melted road in Pakenham Upper. Picture: Stewart Chambers.
By Sarah Schwager
A CRANBOURNE couple is urging local councils to maintain their roads after a nasty motorbike crash landed them both in hospital.
Ross Saultry and wife Christine Ponting were going for a leisurely ride through Pakenham Upper when their bike hit melted tar on a Gembrook Road corner and threw them off.
The incident happened about 1.30pm on Thursday, 4 January near Mann Road.
Mr Saultry, who has been riding motorbikes both for recreation and in competitions for the past 25 years, said the couple did not have a chance.
“We came around the corner and saw half the road melted,” he said.
“There was oil coming to the surface out of the bitumen. It was so soft.”
The motorbike hit the tar and the back slid out.
Mr Saultry dragged his knee on the ground to try to stay upright but the bike lunged and threw him and his wife off.
They were both knocked unconscious and taken to Dandenong Hospital.
Mr Saultry received mild concussion, cuts and abrasions, while Ms Ponting has had three operations to repair a severely broken left leg and one operation on her right hand.
She has already spent two weeks in hospital and will be in hospital for at least another two weeks before she can go home and start rehabilitation.
Mr Saultry said councils needed to make sure their roads were maintained.
“There was no warning. If there was at least adequate signage we might have known to look out for it,” he said.
“We had been on the road for 15 kilometres and had no idea the road was going to change so dramatically.”
Ms Ponting said it was lucky they had been riding carefully and slowly at the time of the crash.
“Ross is such a competent rider,” she said.
“If someone had been flying through that corner and hit the grease they probably would have ended up in the trees.”
Doctors have told Ms Ponting it could be between six and 12 months before she is able to walk properly again.
She had been working at Fountain Gate Ceramics in Narre Warren for only three weeks before the crash, and while she said she was very fortunate the business was keeping her job for her, she did not expect it to be held forever.
“It has been extremely frustrating,” Ms Ponting said.
“Ross has had to go back to work, even though he’s injured too, and look after the kids.
“We don’t have any other choice because we have a mortgage to pay.”
Ms Ponting said the couple’s daughter Rebecca, 22, had come down from Wollongong to help look after their younger children, Anthony, 9, and Calvin, 7.
Mr Saultry said despite their personal struggles since the crash, all they wanted was for councils to patrol their roads and put up signs if needed so that another incident did not occur.
A Cardinia Shire spokesman said the road was owned by VicRoads and therefore was not the council’s responsibility to maintain.
VicRoads did not respond to queries before the News went to press.
