‘She’s in a lot of pain’: ABC legend Margaret Throsby confronts new injuries after e-bike collision

Former ABC broadcaster Margaret Throsby is facing a long road to recovery after breaking several bones and suffering extensive head injuries in an e-bike collision with two teenagers riding a “fat bike” along a popular coastal walking track in the Illawarra region.

The 84-year-old remained in hospital on Thursday, almost one week after she was struck by the rider and passenger while on her regular morning walk in Bulli. She was thrown to the path after colliding with the e-bike, breaking her hip and thumb and bleeding extensively from her head. Doctors suspect she had broken another bone in her hand, which will be confirmed by x-rays this week.

Throsby required a “pins and plates” surgery to repair her hip, while she nursed two haematomas in her head and abrasions to her body. She’s expected to remain in hospital for at least another week, according to daughter Holly, who said her mother was faring well in difficult circumstances.

“Her spirits are up and down – she’s in quite a lot of pain,” said Holly, a musician and author living on the South Coast. “She’s just coming to terms with how the [recovery] process will take.”

Two adults and a teenage girl walking the track when the collision occurred administered first aid to Throsby, while the bike riders, who Holly said were remorseful and took responsibility for the accident, called police.

One of the boys removed his shirt, applying it as a makeshift pillow for Throsby while she lay on the ground. Neither are expected to be charged by police over the crash.

The woman at the scene used her body to shade Throsby from the sun, while the man accompanying her on the walk waved away flies from the blood on the broadcast legend’s head. Paramedics arrived 15 minutes after the collision, providing pain relief to Throsby before she was transported to hospital.

Holly was in the area when she was phoned by a passer-by, rushing to the track, where she encountered a “quite shocking” scene. She has since been in contact with the rider’s father, who has expressed concern for her mother’s welfare.

Police ran a high-visibility e-bike crackdown in the Wollongong and Lake Illawarra regions the day after Throsby was injured in which four infringement notices were issued and 37 e-bike riders stopped. The operation was unrelated to the accident involving Throsby.

Throsby’s daughter called for tougher regulations and education about the danger of the bikes.

“The issue is these bikes are really powerful and really heavy and operated by kids – they’re just too powerful to be operated by kids,” Holly said. “I worry about the kids themselves.”

Throsby spent 55 years at the ABC, joining the public broadcaster as an announcer in 1967 and working across a range of music and current affairs programs until retiring in 2022. She was the first women to read national radio news in 1975, and three years later, became the first woman to present national television news.

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