The ninth series is due to start airing on 8 October 2006 (although this may be delayed due to Richard Hammond's recent accident)

несмотря на серьезность травм, Хаммонд может полностью выздороветь

Top Gear presenter Richard Hammond has been released from hospital after making a remarkable recovery from severe brain injuries following his life-threatening 300mph crash.

The star has started reading car magazines again and even talked about resuming filming of the top BBC show as early as January, saying: “I just want to get back in the driving seat.”

“I just want to get back in the driving seat.”

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'MY NOSE AND EARS WERE FULL OF EARTH ..I WAS INHALING A FIELD'
By Clare Raymond And Victoria Ward

ONLY the bloodshot white of his left eye gives any sign of how close Richard Hammond came to death after crashing a jet car at 288mph.

Speaking for the first time of the horror smash just 33 days ago, the Top Gear star and Mirror columnist said: "I was upside down inhaling a field. My nose and eyes were full of earth. I'd gone ploughing on my head.

"My very last thought was 'Oh bugger, that's gone wrong. Well, we're checking out now. You've had it'.


"I was aware of my brain saying 'We'll wave the flag' - and that was the point I passed out. Doctors use a point system. Fifteen is normal, three is a flatline. I was a three. I was that close to being dead.


"I was in a bad way when they came to get me. The air ambulance guys were amazed I was still breathing.


"Next thing I know I'm coming to in hospital. As far as I'm aware, I got into a car in York and woke up in Leeds."


Richard, 36, crashed his Vampire car at Elvington airfield, York, about a month ago. Astonishingly, the man nicknamed "Hamster" is now ready to return home.


Talking to the Mirror at a secret hideaway where he is recovering with his wife Mindy, 35, and daughters Izzy, six, and Willow, three, he said: "At first they said I'd be in hospital for 15 months.


"Yet here I am ready to go back home after five weeks. I'm so bloody lucky. I can't believe it.


"At the time of the crash I was doing 288mph so it's incredible that every doctor I've spoken to tells me I'm on course for a 100 per cent recovery."


The horror unfolded at the end of a day's Top Gear filming after Richard clambered into the phenomenally powerful jet car - holder of the British land speed record at 300.3mph - for one final run.


He had already made a series of successful runs getting faster at each attempt. He said: "It was the same every time. I got in, I sat there, a man came along, knelt on my chest and strapped me in with this bloody great harness.


"Every time he used to hurt me so much - and I'm bloody glad he did.


HE made sure my crash helmet was on and my visor was down. Then I put the starter motor on to start the jets and was ready to go.


"The car has got less knobs and buttons than a Nissan Micra. It's great. All you do is get in and press a button, literally.


"You take your foot off the brake and just set off down the track with unbelievable acceleration."


"There's no fear because you have to reassure yourself before you do something that the machine is good, the place is right and you're not going to suddenly have a cow on the track or something.


"You become in a suspended state of concentration thinking about what you're going to do. But there's no fear.


"If there was fear it would mean we'd have left something in the air.


"You have to be really strapped into these things and you wouldn't strap in if you thought 'I hope it doesn't crash'. That would just be catastrophic.


"So you go in thinking 'We've done everything, I know how the thing works, I know where I'm going, I know what I'm going to do. Let's get on with it and let it unfold'."


Richard set off on his final run and gathered speed. Then appalled observers saw the open cockpit Vampire suddenly hurtle out of control and crash.


The presenter said: "The car ended up upside down. There was just a roll bar above my head and I was breathing a field.


"Apparently it's true that I told them I needed to film a piece to camera. But I'm buggered if I can remember that.


"It's normal in serious head injuries that you get this initial moment when you think everything is OK. It's like after tripping over on the pavement and getting up like you meant to do it.


"It was like me getting knocked down by a bus and jumping up saying 'I'm fine, everybody!' But very quickly after that, things deteriorate sharply. It was 50/50 what was going to happen. I may have been dead, I may not have woken up.""


Two investigations are under way into the crash but Richard is adamant all safety procedures were followed to the letter.


He said: "I've absolutely no idea what went wrong. One minute I was there and the next I was buried head first, off the track.


THE whole idea had been to experience driving something very unusual. We chatted about the jet car and all I had to do was drive it. It was so easy.


"We wanted to use the afterburners because essentially, if an ordinary car has about 100 horsepower, after you light the afterburners it has 10,000 horsepower.


"It's an amazing amount of power. All I wanted to do was get to the point where I could drive it with the afterburners on, which I did. Apparently there was a load of stuff in the papers about us breaking a land speed record.


"That would be stupid because we'd be putting too much pressure on ourselves to hit a target.


"And in the Top Gear sense it's exciting enough, given that we're all 10-year-olds, just to go 'It's got a jet! How does it feel?' It was my job to explain how it feels. Get me in the car and I'll tell you what it's like.""


Richard is aware that the spotlight is on Top Gear now that the crash is being investigated.


He said: "On Top Gear we live in a world where we have to deal with an element of risk. It's our job to minimise it.


"We're so used to sitting down and deciding how to do things. It doesn't happen without a great deal of work and would never be any other way.


"So in my mind it was less calculable that anything had gone wrong. We spend our lives minimising risk so that's what I couldn't believe. That it had actually gone wrong"


He laughed as he added: "I was actually quite good at driving it. But clearly something went wrong and the day didn't turn out as we planned...to put it mildly!"


For the test, Richard was wearing a set of bright silver Formula One-style flameproof overalls. True to form he had entertained the crew all day darting about as the "Silver Flash".


He said: "I'd laughed about those pants all day. They were the silverest silver you've ever seen. But the point was, I had all the gear, we were all aware of the risks. It's the nature of the job."


Richard describes the crash helmet he wore as the "most spectacular crash helmet you've ever seen". He revealed the manufacturer wants it back to test, saying with a smile: "They told me, that after all it's the fastest test we've ever put it through."


But ultimately, he wants it back as his one souvenir of the day he almost lost his life.


Richard said: "I want it to go in a plinth on the wall in my office. Definitely.


For all I know, it saved my life. We proved that it's worth taking the measures that we take.


"If everybody hadn't been on their toes, if we hadn't had the best possible safety gear, if the crash helmet hadn't been the best, if the helicopter hadn't taken off...


"The very fact that I made it, is testimony to the fact that the precautions we ordinarily take are worth taking. I'm living proof that safety works."


It is hard to imagine the Top Gear ace so recently came so close to death. That bloodshot eye and his gaunt and pale complexion are the only giveaways.


POPULAR Richard, loved by millions of fans who have been praying for his recovery, joked around with his daughters, made faces and laughed over lunch.


And he smiled at the fact that it is only five weeks after he cheated death that he can properly describe what it is like to travel at 288mph in a jet car - and what it is like when it all goes horribly wrong.


Before he headed off for a much-needed nap, he had one final thing on his mind. Richard said: "Do you realise how annoyed I am that I've got no marks on me? Absolutely nothing at all, nothing for the pub.


"There are people who fall off their trikes at the age of four who've got better injuries than me. I've been through hell and I've got nothing to show for it except a chipped tooth! I'm gutted."

HAMMOND EXCLUSIVE: 'I HAD THIS INCREDIBLE PHYSICAL LONGING TO SEE THE KIDS..THEY HAVE BEEN SO BRAVE'
RICHARD HAMMOND: BACK FROM THE DEAD
By Clare Raymond And Victoria Ward

RICHARD HAMMOND can't remember the first visit he had from his two beautiful little daughters after the crash... but it's a moment THEY will never forget.

It was just four days since the horror jet car accident that nearly killed him, and his left eye was still badly bruised and disfigured.

Wife Mindy had asked nurses cover with a patch of white gauze so Izzy, six, and three-year-old Willow would not be frightened.


Richard, 36, says: "All the fluid had just drained into my eye, apparently it was absolutely monstrous.


"It looked like some Klingon eye, all lumpy and full of fluid.


"Apparently, I was told whatever I did not to pull the gauze off. And what did I do?


'Look at this kids, ta-daaa.'"


Fortunately, the girls appear to have inherited their dad's nerves of steel - and they were not fazed by the grisly sight.


Richard adds: "They weren't scared at all, apparently."


But once he was aware of his situation, visits from the children became the most painful and difficult part of being trapped in hospital.


Even now, simply recalling those days is an emotional experience.


He says: "I had this incredible physical longing to see them. I don't think I'd ever felt that before, it was very difficult.


"The first time I can actually remember seeing them was after moving hospitals from Leeds to Bristol.


"Mindy brought the kids in to see me in my room. It was so bloody hard.


"We've never believed in hiding things from the kids. We never lie to them. So Mindy had told them enough so they understood the basic of what had happened and that I had been badly hurt. But they knew I was on the mend.


"The poor girls held themselves together so well. They were just so incredibly brave. No tears, just saying hello to their dad and asking all their questions.


"Then they'd go and walk to the lift and I'd totter down the corridor and would wave goodbye to them and Izzy, every time, just as the doors were closing, would turn to Mindy and her eyes just welled...her face collapsed. Then the lift door would close and that was it, they were gone.


"The lift was next to the ward reception and I'd be stood there, my eyes filling up and people looking at me and all I could do was try to smile.


"But inside I was in bits, knowing my poor little girl was so terribly upset."


And Richard is acutely aware that for the mother of his children, the pressure of looking after a sick husband, two young kids - plus having to act as gatekeeper to the dozens of friends and colleagues who wanted to visit him - was placing an almost impossible burden upon her. Yet somehow, she coped.


The Mirror motoring columnist says: "I was aware of Mindy being there all the time as I drifted in and out of consciousness. It's not nice for a wife to have to stand there and go: 'There's my husband, on life support, being breathed for.'


"She had to go shuttling back and forth not knowing whether I was going to get better or not, all the time trying to make sure the kids were OK.


"She is the mother of two young daughters who are inquisitive and demanding. And she was the liaison point, if someone wanted to visit they had to arrange it through her.


"But even with all that going on, she was an absolute rock.


"This was a big ask. The biggest ask ever. And yes, it was bloody hard.


I HAVE always said if I was to be stuck in the desert with one thing for survival, it would be her. I wouldn't say this has affected our relationship because we were already as close as you could be.


"But, yeah, it's going to be one of those things that tie us together even more."


Richard takes the chance to pay particular tribute, in his own affectionate manner, to the qualities that allowed Mindy, 35, to cope so well with the situation. He says: "She's just tough.


She's made of gristle and string. She's resilient and creative. And she was sorely tested in that." He turns to his wife and says: "You were sorely tested, I know that.


"You had no idea whether your husband would recover at all, or be permanently damaged."


Richard adds: "She handled all of the friends and relatives without having a wobble, without falling apart. It's incredible.


"I'm just slightly worried that she's never had that moment... the big scene where she gets on her knees and breaks down and all the birds fly out of the trees."


But probably the worst feeling Richard has about September's drag car crash while filming Top Gear in Elvington, North Yorks, is the lingering sense of guilt that people he loves most had to see him at death's door.


He says: "I've apologised to every member of my family and all my friends that came to visit, because the one thing I feel awful about is that they had to see someone in that state.


"I know it lives with you forever. That kind of image never leaves you.


WE ALL see that image of someone bashed up and wired up in hospital so often in films that we have these terrible associations with it.


"It's impossible not to walk into that environment and immediately think of the last time we saw the aftermath of a terrible incident on a film and we think the worst. And going through that emotion has a lasting effect on people.


"I feel terribly guilty about that. That's the biggest regret about the whole thing, that I put people I love through that.


"At one point I managed to nick a phone from someone and quietly rang all my Top Gear mates and said 'I'm bloody sorry you had to come and see that.'


"I know it stays with you when you've gone home.


"It's not undignified for me, it's bloody unpleasant for them."


His parents, Alan and Eileen, were particularly affected by the sight of their son in the aftermath of the accident.


Clearly hurt, Richard explains his feelings about them suffering such a dreadful experience.


He says: "You just don't want them to go through it. My mother and father coming to visit and then they see that.


"What must it have been like for my mum to see the eldest of her three sons just lying there? I was a mess.


"They were very shaken. My parents don't particularly like the fact that I'm doing all this stuff for Top Gear anyway.


"One of the things I'm most looking forward to is getting back with them and for it all to be back to normal. That's what the goal is."


Always close to his two brothers, Nick, 32, and Andy, 34, Richard also felt a strong urge to see to them as he recovered.


He says: "Family matters so much to me, once I'd come round from the accident, I wanted to see my brothers like I was a 10-year-old again.


"Both my brothers are so grown up, but we're very close. Nick is a banker and Andy's a teacher. So they think I'm just a bloody idiot anyway."

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HAMMOND EXCLUSIVE: 'I FELT MAD AS A BAG OF SNAKES. MY MIND WAS LIKE A FOREIGN PLACE, NOTHING IN IT BUT BLANKNESS'
RICHARD HAMMOND: BACK FROM THE DEAD
By Victoria Ward And Clare Raymond

EMERGING from his coma, a terrible knowledge that something was horribly wrong made Richard Hammond panic.

He said: "My mind was like an office that had been utterly ransacked. All the filing cabinets were knocked over.

"It was a total mess and I couldn't find my way around any more. My own mind was like a foreign place. I didn't know where anything was.


"It was like everybody had messed all the furniture up, nothing was familiar. So you try to think about something and it's all strange. Like somebody had ripped my head apart.


"It was utterly terrifying - the scariest thing that's ever happened to me. It made me panic. It made me desperate.


"Sometimes there was nothing there, complete blankness. I've never been so scared in my entire life."


Richard, who suffered serious short-term memory loss known as traumatic amnesia, has only hazy flashbacks of those first days he spent in Leeds General Hospital.


And he admits that as he recovered he behaved childishly and irrationally. He said: "Basically I was mad as a bag of snakes."


In his darkest moments he lost all associations with the normal world and struggled to piece together even the simplest things.


He said: "All my coping mechanisms had gone. I'd sit down to try to gather my thoughts, have a little daydream, and there was nothing there. It's the most horrific feeling.


"I was standing there and watching everything I knew disappear through my fingers up to the point where I could barely hold on to my own name."


Richard candidly revealed he was regularly reduced to tears in his grim battle back to health.


He said: "Yes, I've cried a lot. There've been many, many private breakdowns. I'd be confused and panicky. "


The first two days after Richard's near-fatal 288mph jet car crash at York were critical.


It was feared the much loved Top Gear presenter, who lay unconscious in intensive care, could be paralysed down one side and lose all sight in his left eye.


He said: "There was spotting on my brain for the first 48 hours - haemorrhaging. The big worry was my left side was not responding.


"There was clearly a great danger of many nasty things happening to my brain - swelling, sudden bleeding.


"There were so many tubes and wires it was impossible to tell where the machines ended and I began."


At first surgeons thought they might have to drill a "bore hole" in Richard's head to drain the blood from his brain.


But incredibly he did not have any surgery and has not been taking any medication for the past fortnight apart from the odd Nurofen.


AS Richard slowly regained consciousness two days after the crash he refused to believe he had had an accident, though wife Mindy, 36, reminded him every day.


He said: "For two weeks, all the time I was in Leeds, I simply didn't believe I'd been in a crash. Mindy kept telling me over and over, but I refused to believe it.


"I'm dimly aware of a time when I was in intensive care, of bits of conversations, of a sense of people being around, a sense of urgency.


"That feeling went on for quite some time. I'd wake up and be very lucid, then pass out and forget it."


As well as suffering intense mental anguish, Richard was also gripped by excruciating pain. He compares one of his darkest moments to a scene from the Stephen King horror story Misery.


He said: "I needed morphine for the pain. It was like in Misery where the writer has these splintered legs after his car crash and the psycho nurse gives him the drug.


"In the book Stephen King says it's like soothing ocean waves covering up the jagged trusses of wood exposed in the sea.


"Sharp jagged pointy pain. Just agonising. It hurt like hell. The moment the nurse mentioned morphine I went 'Oh yes please'."


But it was Richard's mental state which caused most concern.


He said: "I'd no recollection of the crash so was quite happy. But what followed that was feeling increasingly aware that there was a problem.


"I'd sit down on a bench here for a good think, and then 'Aaagh!' As soon as I wandered off it wasn't familiar any more. It was horrible.


NORMALLY, when I'm at rock bottom, like anyone else I evolve techniques for coping. When you're feeling low there are always places in ur mind you can go to.


"Your brain wanders off. Your mind at its best is like a familiar landscape and you can daydream. I'm a great daydreamer, I love it.


"But all of those techniques were gone and for a very long my brain was a bit unfamiliar.


"Because of the nature of the injury there was no comfort. I couldn't snap myself out of it.


"My conversations were rambling and every now and then I'd stop, look out of the window and start again.


"Every meal was a surprise, even though I'd ordered them myself. The doctors came in each morning and asked what day it was, what was their name?


"I couldn't remember. It was the most awful feeling. There was nothing there in my head. I'd try and cheat and write things down on my hand so I'd know.


"But it was all completely normal, apparently. Well, normal for a serious brain injury at least.


"Mindy said I was really quite lovely at some points very early on. I wasn't my usual questioning self, I wasn't analysing things. I was just having fun.


"I regressed into a little boy. All my emotions became very childlike, very fragile. The last time I was in hospital was when I was five and needed grommets.


"My mind flashed back to that time. My needs became very basic. All I wanted was a penknife and a comic book with Spitfires on it."


It wasn't until Richard was moved to a private hospital in Bristol two weeks after the crash that the situation began to sank in.


He said: "Mindy came into the room and I said 'I've had a really bad crash, haven't I?' It was in childish terms because I had to break it down into the simplest possible way.


"How could it happen to me? I just don't get hurt. I do speedboats, ride bikes and horses and motorbikes and go rowing and God knows what.


"I've never broken a bone in my body. I thought I was invincible."


RICHARD admitted he was not easy to care for. He said: "By all accounts, I was an awful patient. I remember occasionally being cross and being told that I'd pulled all my wires out.


"All I wanted to do was go outside and have a beer. I was basically mad as a bag of snakes. I'm sure there were phases when I was utterly bonkers.


"I wasn't supposed to make phone calls so I stole one and rang round my friends. I couldn't tell you what I'd had for lunch, but I could find and rebuild a mobile phone! I came very close to trying to escape.


"All I wanted to do when I was moved to the hospital in Bristol was climb out of the window with my sheets knotted together and walk to a shopping centre.


"I wanted to buy a cake and some newspapers and treat myself to something silly.


"I wanted to go to a gadget shop and get a remote controlled car, or treat Mindy and the kids to some clothes.


"I felt very lucid. I argued with the doctors. I was desperately trying to persuade them to let me out and get back to work.


"But conversely, within two hours I'd be lying in the middle of the bed feeling awful, so it didn't make any sense. Looking back, it was hilarious but at the time it was utterly terrifying."


Richard is aware that he must still take it easy. He said: "I'm not out of the woods yet, it's not over. The one thing I want to do is to recover properly.


"What we're doing at the moment is laying the foundations for that recovery.


"Emotionally, I'm still a long way from being back to normal. They predicted a big slump for me this week, which is neurochemical as well as physical.


"I still can't watch any sort of violence on a DVD. I just disintegrate into tears.


"My head can hurt but I try not to have painkillers as I'd rather know if something is hurting.


"I'm still seeing the doctors regularly. Every single one of them is confident that I'll make a complete recovery.


"Every time they say that I want to burst into tears. That tells you how broken I've become."


MY KIDS HAVE BEEN SO BRAVE

TV STAR Richard Hammond has been offered a £2 million deal to stay with the BBC.

The Top Gear presenter suffered brain injuries after crashing a 300mph dragster last month. He is currently recovering in a Bristol hospital.

RICHARD: LEGO SAVED MY LIFE
RICHARD HAMMOND: BACK FROM THE DEAD

DURING his stay in hospital Richard became obsessed with Lego and the card game Top Trumps which, he says, aided his recovery.

"Lego saved my life," he said. "I was a Lego fiend when I was eight and, suddenly, it was all I wanted to do again.

"James May sent me a massive tractor with a plough on the back. The doctor was amazed at how good I am at it. It's really good therapy for a brain injury. Brilliant for spatial awareness.


"James also sent me a pack of Top Trumps. I played with Mindy and we were addicted. But it was Supercars and we were arguing over top speeds.


"Whilst I couldn't remember the day, my name or the doctor's name I could remember the specific capacity of a Pagani Zonda.


"It was good for remembering facts. Just using my brain again. These days it's all I bloody do - Lego and Top Trumps."