Bundaberg teenager Jake McCollum airlifted to hospital after surviving 80m fall off Mount Walsh

A Queensland teenager has survived after falling 80m from the top of a mountain in the state’s south east.

Jake McCollum was hiking up Mount Walsh at Biggenden in November for his first ever solo hike when he fell.

The 18-year-old from Bundaberg was taking a photos of the summit when moments later he lost his footing on mossy rocks still wet from overnight rain that began to crumble beneath him.

“Literally seconds later, I fell,” McCollum said.

“There was nowhere to go but down. I kind of knew it was going to happen before it happened.”

The young real estate agent said he fell straight down off the steep drop off.

“There wasn’t a lot to break my fall, I fell through one tree at the very bottom but there was a lot of falling before that,” He said.

“Initially I did a bit of rolling, like a little bit of a rumble, and then a drop off, but for most of it I was falling and I landed with a thud on my back.”

McCollum said he was “pretty banged up” and tried to catch his breath after the fall, but everything hurt.

“The wind was knocked out of me, and I remember thinking it was probably all over for me. I didn’t really think it was survivable,” he said.

McCollum’s backpack had been flung off him in the fall but luckily landed nearby.

Crawling over rocks he grabbed the personal identification beacon he had packed and activated it.

The alert was picked up in Canberra and a call made to McCollum’s parents.

McCollum’s phone was smashed, but on hearing his AirPods ringing, he managed to crawl and find them and a short time later was speaking to his mother, Rachel.

“I tried again, and luckily that was the call that connected,” Rachel said.

“And I heard really, really faintly: ‘Mum, I’m hurt really bad’. And I think my heart sank, my knees went, it’s probably the worst news you can ever hear.

“I don’t know how many times he said during that phone call: ‘I think I’m going to die’.”

Rachel stayed on the phone with her son for more than five hours as he lay injured in 36C with no water, passing on messages to Queensland Police Service scene coordinator Greg Manskie, and ensured everything she said was reassuring her son and keeping him calm.

“When the helicopter did arrive, I remember thinking ,‘oh, this is great’,” McCollum said.

“But then it went right past me.

“And I was talking through the phone and saying: ‘It’s gone past me, it’s gone past me!’ It was back and forth for quite a while.”

“And then eventually they spotted me.”

Doctor Harvey, flight paramedic Michael Porter and rescue crew officer Alexander Bartolo winched down 150m to McCollum.

“We were surprised he was alive, given the story we’d been told,” Harvey said.

“So, we were very relieved to find him awake, conscious and talking.”

McCollum suffered a fractured spine, broken ribs, internal bleeding, a head laceration and concussion in the fall.

He was airflited to hospital and spent several days in hospital recovering.

“Something massive has happened to our family and we are one of the lucky ones, you know, we get to hug our child and say goodnight to him,” Rachel said.

“We are very aware that so many others can’t, so it’s just been a very overwhelming feeling of joy.

“I’m just extremely grateful to those men and they have our extreme gratitude for what they do.

“We are very lucky.”