The injured British soldier who delivered the Paralympic flame in spectacular fashion from a zip-wire high above the London skyline has paid tribute to doctors who allowed him to make the opening ceremony.
Joe Townsend, a former Royal Marine commando who lost both legs when he stepped on an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan, told The Times newspaper that he contracted an infection last week and needed surgery.
“It was down to them that I was there,” he was quoted as saying by the daily. “I was rushed into hospital on Monday. Luckily my surgeons came in on their time off to operate to get me ready in time to be at the Opening Ceremony.”
Townsend, dressed in a Games tracksuit and without his prosthetic legs, descended with the torch from the 115-metre (377-feet) high observation tower overlooking the Olympic Stadium in east London on Wednesday evening.
He then handed the torch over to Britain’s five-a-side football team captain Dave Clarke, who in turn passed it to Margaret Maughan, Britain’s first Paralympic gold medallist at Rome in 1960, to light the cauldron.
Townsend, an aspiring para-triathlete who hopes to compete at the next Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro in 2016 when the sport makes its debut, told the daily that he was able to be fit enough for the final dress rehearsal.
