Serving his country was always something that Jonathan Bell aspired to do. Brought up in a military family, Jonathan was no stranger to war stories or the job that faced him. So in 1986 Jonathan joined the 1st Battalion, The Green Howards, completing several tours in Northern Ireland. But it was on a military training exercise for operations in Bosnia in1993 that Jonathan and 15 other soldiers were seriously injured. As a result of the accident, Jonathan was left paralysed from the upper chest, with severe head and leg injuries, and a foot amputation.
We were on a Brigade exercise, training for deployment for Bosnia” said Jonathan, “when a car went through our foot patrol at night. In total 16 guys were seriously injured.
Everybody deals with it in different ways. You take a bit of time but you work through it as best you can I suppose. I think you have to redefine yourself. As a young soldier you define yourself in terms of strength and fitness, and then, suddenly, you find yourself at the other end of the spectrum, and you have to work out who you are, and what you’re going to do next.
Jonathan, who was 26 years old at the time, spent 7 months in hospital. His leg had an external metal fixator put into place to try and save it for several years.
Jonathan focus was on being healthy and focusing on what his body could do. He also went back to education where he completed his A-levels and graduated from university. This led to him having a career as a BBC journalist, producing programmes for Panorama and Newsnight, and now he has an 18 month-old daughter, Sara, with his wife, Katie.
Blesma got me into the hand cycling, and the effect of that one week has had a positive impact. This bike ride is about a bunch of old soldiers getting together to support a good cause as much as anything. There’s about five of us that were injured that day who are going to be riding.”
Whilst Jonathan has remained strongly independent, his family and Regiment were great sources of support for him. Something that has remained today as 70 people, friends from his Regiment and Blesma Members, have rallied in to join Jonathan on a 100-mile cycle event for Blesma Week. Riding a 100 miles on a hand bike is going to be hard. There’s a lot of training involved – Jonathan trains most days. So, why join an event that may take 8 hours or more to complete and is going to be so challenging?
It’s got to be a real challenge, and this will be tough for most of us. Everyone’s training hard, and posting their training rides on social media. We’ve got two aims; one is to raise awareness for the work Blesma does, and the second is to raise money. Oh and third, it’s got to be fun”!
Blesma 100 is one of many events happening as part of Blesma week which starts Monday 6th June to 12th June. If you wish to donate you can visit www.blesma.org/donate or if you want take part in a Blesma Week activity click here
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