Family appeal to bring home Thai road crash victim

A 20-year-old British father is fighting for his life with severe brain injuries after falling from a moving pick-up truck in Thailand.

Ethan Lacey, from Castle Vale, Birmingham, was visiting his cousin in Pattaya when he went missing last month. His family later found him in intensive care, where they were told his life support had to be turned off.

"We were told he would die straight away. We had to tell his brother, and the rest of the family. But he didn't die. He's still alive and he's breathing on his own and he's stable for his condition," his dad Kevin Lacey said.

The family said the priority now was raising money to bring him back to the UK.

Relatives still do not know exactly what happened.

"There was a witness that said the tyre went over his head. He's still got tyre marks on his shoulders and side of his face.

"He had three bleeds on the brain. He's broken his jaw, fractured his neck, broken his shoulder, arm, hand. It was just tragic, it was just a shock," Kevin added.

Days before the fall, the traveller had extended his planned four-week trip, but his family said he had forgotten to renew his travel insurance.

They are now raising money and trying to take out personal loans to get him on a specialist flight home and pay for medical bills in Thailand.

"He had insurance for four weeks and he was planning to come home, but because the flights were expensive he didn't renew the insurance.

"So that's obviously a nightmare. We are where we are now, and we have to do our best to get home."

Ethan, who has a 3-year-old daughter, is slowly showing signs of movement, including moving his hands and fingers.

"Today, he squeezed his mum's hand. We believed he was paralyzed but the last few days he's been moving his toes.

"His body has decided to live and fight for it. So we have decided to fight for him," Kevin added.

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