Nightlong Ordeal : Both Feet Broken, Fall Victim Crawled Along Beach for Help

In the longest and most painful night of his life, Victor Ballard crawledalong a rocky Encinitas beach for 12 excruciating hours early Wednesday--the crashing waves drowning out his cries for help after a 60-foot fall from the bluffs above broke both his feet.

Wrapping his shattered left foot in his shirt, the 33-year-old transient used his hands and bloodied knees to pick his way through the darkness along a half-mile stretch of rocky coastline, “trying to make my way out of there, one rock at a time.”

As the surging ocean water kept him from passing out, Ballard battled bursts of pain and fatigue--as well as the ants he says swarmed on is wounds once the night tide subsided--until being rescued by an early morning surfer.

“It was painful, but I knew I had to keep going,” the red-headed man recalled during an interview Thursday from his bed at Scripps Memorial Hospital in La Jolla. “I was mad. I was cursing at myself for the idiotic judgment that got me into this situation. At the same time, I kept telling myself ‘Hey, I’m alive!’ ”

Rescue workers say Ballard is indeed lucky to have survived both the fall and his ensuing overnight crawl. “I’d say he was pretty fortunate,” said Don Heiser, Encinitas Fire Department operations chief.

“He suffered two badly broken feet. And then to be exposed to the elements all night--he’s real lucky.”

Doctors say Ballard suffered a compound fracture in his left foot, a fractured right foot and spine, and a mild case of hypothermia. They said they planned to operate Thursday afternoon.

“With his open wounds, we don’t yet know the extent of his infection,” said Dr. Thomas Laughlin, an orthopedic surgeon who is one of two physicians treating Ballard. “That’s a serious problem. To lay there all night, the chances of contamination are high.”

Officials say numerous people are killed in falls from unstable bluffs along the Southern California coastline. Others survive with a host of spinal injuries and stay put until rescue workers arrive.

“But this man crawled,” said Dr. Louis Powers, another physician who has attended Ballard. “He crawled like a baby before it learns to walk.”

Added Laughlin: “If you have to do it, you do it. I think he was in partial shock. It hurts, but you don’t have any options. You crawl.”

Ballard, a self-employed trash hauler, says he had spent several nights in recent weeks sleeping outdoors along the coastal brush in the North County city. Just before dusk on Tuesday, he recalled, he was walking along a posted section of bluff just north of Swami’s Beach when the ground gave way.

“I ran and jumped from the soft sand to this lip of harder-packed sand--and the thing disintegrated on me,” he said. “And I thought ‘That’s all she wrote now, Vic.’ ”

Instinctively, he tried to dig his fingers into the loosely packed dirt to break his fall. But a startled Ballard tumbled an estimated three stories--landing on both feet atop the uneven rocks below. “It happened so fast,” he said.

Dressed in two pairs of pants beneath a pair of shorts, Ballard said he had taken his shoes off before the fall--which allowed him to quickly inspect his injuries.

“My right foot was all swollen,” he said. “And the bone and tendon were sticking out of my left foot about 6 inches. I winced just looking at it. I wrapped my shirt around it just to keep the stuff inside.”

He called out for someone to telephone 911, screaming that he was bleeding to death. But the crashing surf at high tide muffled his cries from the people in homes and apartment buildings above. “But I didn’t panic. I kept my cool, he said. “And the blasts of water refreshed me. Good old salt water.”

Over the past several months, the Newport Beach native had used his pickup truck to operate a local trash and furniture-hauling business he called Trash Busters. When he could, he slept in local hotels while bouncing back from what he called a bitter divorce.

When money was short, he slept on the bluffs--where he met a handful of other transients who regularly camp out on the nearby beach. So that night, Ballard decided to try and crawl the mile or so to the camp.

The going was arduous, he recalled. He would wince as the jagged rocks often cut into his knees as he tried to keep his two broken feet elevated. Soon, a rhythm developed--a few pulls ahead, then time to wince and rest.

In time, his bloodied knees began to hurt more than his feet.

“I was moaning the whole way,” he said. “But I tried to keep my mind on the long-term goal of getting out of there.”

When dawn came, Ballard recalled, he began calling out to people he thought he saw walking toward him on the beach. Then he felt the ants and tried to shake them from his wound.

At 7 a.m., he spotted a man in a sweater standing on the wooden steps descending to the beach from D Street in downtown Encinitas. Again, he called out. But, apparently not hearing him, the man turned and walked away.

An hour later, rescue workers say, an unidentified surfer spotted Ballard lying on the pebbly shoreline. “I called out to him and he said ‘What do you need?’ ” Ballard said. “Then when he saw my wounds, he flipped out. He tried to carry me.”

The sweater-clad man Ballard had spotted earlier was summoned to call paramedics. While they waited for help to arrive, Ballard recalled, his rescuer asked if he needed anything.

“I guess I was delirious by then,” he said. “I told him I wanted him to go to a hotel room and take a shower because of the ants. I wanted to get rid of the ants. I guess I wasn’t thinking straight.”

Doctors say Ballard will be off his feet for several months while he recuperates. He says he still doesn’t know how he’s going to survive without being able to work.

But he says he’s thankful to the two men who finally rescued him. And he’s got a message for others who take chances along the unstable coastline bluffs.

“Don’t do it,” he said, looking down at the ice packs on his ankles--and at his feet, which were wrapped in casts and bandages. “Use me as an example. Those signs say ‘Danger. Stay away.’ And they mean it.

“I went for it anyway and it was a foolhardy thing to do. Now I’ve got two shattered feet and a lot of unanswered questions about my future. I don’t feel too good right now.”