In 1974 a terrifying ambush on an expedition to climb Everest left former reporter Tom Dowling of Great Sutton paralysed from the waist down. Dad-of-three Tom spoke to Selena O’Donnell about how a life of embracing challenges saw him collect a lifetime achievement award last week

AN EXCITED Tom and good friends Phil Wellings, Ken Stokes and Peter Cooper, set off on March 15, 1974, in the Ellesmere Port Boys’ Club’s Bedford minibus with their savings and hundreds of tea bags from Typhoo, their sponsor.

Tom, of Gleneagles Road, Great Sutton, admits the foursome had been ‘crafty’ by choosing to start to play football for the club – all the time keeping an eye on its minibus.

“I’d seen Summer Holiday with Cliff Richard and made a decision to go on that type of journey and knew I just needed to find a few others to go with me,” said Tom, 57.

After some sweet talking to the club’s bosses and some willing friends, Tom’s dreams of conquering Everest and setting off on the open road began to inch its way to reality.

“The van was a bit of a wreck and my brother Jim renovated it for us,” recalls Tom, then a cub reporter on the Ellesmere Port Pioneer, sister paper of The Chronicle.

“We painted it sky blue and spent a lot of time rigging up a great stereo-system in it – so that we could have music blasting out.”

The planned route was through Belgium, Germany, Austria, old Yugoslavia and Bulgaria. Two of them would usually sleep in the van with the other two in a tent.

Then they advanced through Turkey to Iran, into Afghanistan, over the Khyber Pass, through Pakistan, and on to Delhi.

On the way back, they camped off a desert highway in Iran. “We really rounded the whole trip off that night,” remembers Tom.

“We were talking about our next expedition. Phil and I were going to the Rockies. That night Phil and Ken slept inside the van. Peter and I slept on the luggage rack in big sleeping bags.

“I awoke and saw the huge sun rising on the horizon and thought what a fantastic feeling it was to be 20 and to have had all those experiences.

“Life was just about to happen. I put my head back on the spare wheel which was acting as my pillow.

“Suddenly all the windows were smashed and all hell broke out. I sat up and we saw these two characters hurling rocks at the van. I got the sleeping bag down to my waist and Peter was standing up on the van.

“He was shouting that they had a gun. Suddenly it felt as though a boulder with a point had fallen out of the sky and right into my sternum. A bullet had gone between my shoulder blades and cut the spinal cord in two.

“But I was still conscious and able to shout and wave my arms. As I put my hands down, I felt these cold lumps of jelly. They were my legs. I couldn’t feel them. Peter jumped off the van and chased the two across the fields.

“When they were about 20 yards, they turned round and faced him with the gun. That moment is etched in my memory. There were these three silhouetted characters. I knew instantly that this could be it. But they fled.

“When Peter got in the van, blood was everywhere. A bullet had gone through the van and into Ken’s head. It stopped just before his brain.”

The uninjured pair drove Tom and Ken to a nearby Red Crescent hospital. They arrived at Walton Hospital in early June. Ken recovered, but it was decided not to operate on Tom.

The bullet, which eventually disintegrated, was left in his back.

Tom has always maintained a positive attitude to what happened, electing instead to look forward.

“It caused all sorts of sudden, dramatic changes that affected the whole family, in many ways they suffered more than me.

“Even then I was thinking that all these families facing disabilities, all these people must have been going through the same sort of thing we were.”

Once recovered, Tom took up a position at The Ellesmere Port News, thanks to its editor Dave Williams, and as his career progressed the reality of his new life began to hit home.

“When I started work on The Liverpool Echo I realised I’d gone from being a fit lad, playing football regularly to suddenly being in this situation and you can find yourself being isolated.

“From 9-5pm you are great but then you got home and that was it – there was no where else to go. All the pubs and clubs had steps to get in and then once you were there there weren’t the right toilets or anything like that.

“It wasn’t your mates’ fault, that’s just the way it was.”

This hadn’t stopped Tom packing his backpack just 12 months after his devastating injury and heading off with a friend on another adventure around North America for five months.

“I did it so I could see what kind of challenges I would have camping with a wheelchair, staying in a cavalry-style tent.

“And it was quite tough but you had to learn to be resourceful, resourceful enough to realise that one place you’d find a toilet you could use would be a hospital.

“As it was so close to the Vietnam War, I would sneak into the hospitals and pretend to be a patient to use the toilet.

“What you’ve always got to remember is that if it’s tough for you, it’s been even tougher for those twenty, thirty or forty years earlier.”

It was this enduring empathy that inspired Tom to approach his bosses at The Echo about creating a weekly column called ‘I Can Do That’ that dealt with disability in an upbeat, comical way – a ground-breaking approach at the time.

“It was always intended to be not just for people affected by disability. It’s the people in the mainstream that change things, they are the decision makers.”

Twenty seven years on, the award-winning column is still going. Due to its popularity, in 1997, Tom and The Echo launched All Together Now, a supplement approaching disability with the same positive message.

All Together Now picked up a number of its own accolades before Tom left six years ago to set up the paper as a charitable concern.

He said: “We now produce 60,000 copies across the North West and its gone on to win a number of community and media awards.”

He continues to strive toward presenting a more realistic portrayal of life with a disability – one that he continues to live to the full alongside wife Lynne, son Joe, 20 and twin boys Dan and Ben, 18.

Recent reader research has revealed that of it 240,000 strong readership, half of those regularly enjoying All Together Now are not disabled, something that delights Tom.

“It’s a lifestyle magazine-type of paper that’s coming at it from the other viewpoint, that not everyone has two arms and two legs.”

Reflecting on his recent Lifetime Achievement Award, Tom said: “It’s brilliant, to think that all the judges and the industry have given it you is amazing.

“It’s great, they are acknowledging what you are doing as a journalist and what I’m doing to raise awareness about disability in the community.”

He added: “I’d just like to say a massive thanks to everyone who contributed, this could never have happened without their fantastic support.”

For more information about All Together Now visit alltogethernow.org.uk or pick up your copy from National Waterways Museum, Ellesmere Port Hospital, Sainsbury’s Cheshire Oaks, and Burleydam Nursery.

All Together Now is always on the look out for new distribution points in the area. Please contact Tom Dowling via www.alltogethernow.org.uk.