A Melbourne woman remains in a critical condition after a giant gum tree fell on her car.
Emergency crews had to climb inside the wreckage to the rescue the 50-year-old woman, who was trapped for 20 minutes.
An off-duty paramedic came to the rescue when he drove past the horrific scene in Boronia, in the city’s west.
He called emergency services and comforted her until they arrived.
“The first problem we had was the size of the tree — when responding units got here we had no idea there was even a car under it,” Senior Sergeant Cliff Sunderland told Nine News.
“You can see from the damage that if it wasn’t for a couple of centimetres, she would have been killed instantly.”
Ambulance Victoria group manager Paul Howells said the paramedic noticed the car when he was stuck in a traffic jam.
“As he’s gone up to do a U-turn, he’s seen the tree on the road and noticed the headlights of the car under the tree.”
The woman was trapped by her legs and suffered head injuries.
Her temperature was lowered to four degrees in an attempt to decrease the impact of a traumatic brain injury and she was airlifted to the Alfred Hospital in a critical condition.
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