MY FRIEND Kelly and I were returning from a two-week beach holiday in Goa. We had an early flight back to the UK from Mumbai, and rather than endure a frantic transfer, we decided to fly to Mumbai the evening before, and booked ourselves into the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel.
After checking in to the Taj, we headed to the densely packed Leopold Café in town for a drink. Half an hour after we left, gunmen opened fire on the restaurant. An hour later, we were back in our room when I heard the first gunshot outside the hotel. I’d never heard a noise like it before; it was strange and ominous. I knew immediately that something was wrong. After a second shot we opened the door to our room, but the staff standing in the corridor didn’t bat an eyelid. It was a very eerie atmosphere. After hearing another shot, Kelly and I ran to the spiral stairwell, which was 50 feet from our room and which overlooked the lobby. There was no one down there and the lobby was filled with smoke.
Across the landing, a fellow guest suddenly appeared. As I looked up, our eyes met. Neither of us said a word. Kelly and I retreated back to our room and locked ourselves in the bathroom. For some reason we thought this would be the safest place to hide. At this point, we were convinced that this was either the work of a lone gunman who would soon run out of ammunition, or a couple of assailants who would be seeking hostages. We had no idea of the scale of what was going on.
Once we’d locked ourselves in, I called my dad in the UK from the bathroom; I whispered that something was wrong, and asked him whether he could he find out what it was. For two hours after that the phone line was dead, and then the internal line rang. At first we didn’t answer, but when it rang a second time, I picked up.
A woman’s voice said: “I work for the hotel. Everything is under control, stay where you are.” The moment I hung up, I realized that by answering the phone I’d told the gunmen that we were in our room. At that moment, it felt like game over.
Thirty minutes later, my brother called. He said that television reports were showing our hotel surrounded by terrorists, and that the floor above ours was on fire. We had to come up with an escape plan. For the next two hours, we were frantically tying together sheets and curtains — anything we get hold of — to make a rope, all the time consoling each other and hiding in the bath every time there was an explosion.
The windows were double-glazed, but a gunshot had fractured a single outside pane. Smoke was seeping under the door as I attempted to smash the window with a wrought-iron table. That’s when it all went wrong. I decided to go first, to test the rope. I told Kelly that I loved her and then descended. After about 30 seconds, the rope untied. I don’t remember falling.
The impact left me with a fractured elbow, wrist, left pelvis and spine; I was left a paraplegic and the chance of any recovery is very slight. I have been in hospital in the UK for six months now.
As Tessa Jowell has since noted, I am “an anomaly”, not eligible for any compensation. My travel insurance doesn’t cover acts of terrorism, and the Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme doesn’t cover injuries abroad. The only option I have left is to turn myself into a charity case.
— To donate, visit willpikemumbaiappeal.co.uk. Will Pike would like to thank everyone at the spinal-injuries unit at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, Stanmore, for their continued support.