Mainwaring feared dead

[Burgs]

The "Original" #3.
I just find this so very very sad.
Sincerest condolences to Chris' family and all that he touched in his dynamic life.
Hopefully you will all appreciate that with the closeness of a WA born identity you might lay off any innuendo and speculation out of respect for those on TWF who knew him or his family.

Mainwaring dead in late night tragedy

1st October 2007, 10:00 WST

Former Eagles player and champion footballer Chris Mainwaring has died, police have confirmed.

In a statement this morning, police confirmed that the dual-premiership player, 41, was taken to Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital by ambulance shortly after midnight.

It is understood Mainwaring may have suffered a seizure at his up-market Haining Avenue home in Cottesloe.

Police responded to a complaint regarding a man yelling in the street at 11.25pm.

It is understood Mainwaring was calm when emergency services arrived but he refused assistance from the ambulance.

He was placed in the care of a neighbour, and returned to his home without incident.

Shortly afterward, St Johns Ambulance was called again and found the man unconscious.

He was taken to SCGH and pronounced deceased a short time later.

Major Crime is investigating the circumstances surrounding Mainwaring’s death on behalf of the coroner, as is the procedure for all unexpected deaths.

PETA RULE

Chris Mainwaring

Fast Facts:

Jumper No: 3

Height: 179

Weight: 83

DOB: 27/12/1965

Recruited From: East Fremantle (WA)

Career Matches: 201

Career Goals: 84

About

The career of champion wingman Chris Mainwaring was motoring along nicely until he backed into a pack of on-coming players in the round two clash with Geelong at Kardinia Park in 1997. That split-second decision, which was instinctively as fearless as he had always been, changed his life forever. To that stage Mainwaring was in a neck and neck struggle with Guy McKenna in the race to be the first West Coast player to achieve 200 games, but the impact of that collision and a subsequent knee reconstruction saw Mainwaring play just eight more games. A tireless wingman, Mainwaring had to that point finished in the club’s top 10 in the club champion award seven times and was three times runner-up. A dual premiership player, for many the defining moment of the 1992 triumph was Mainwaring ecstatically jumping off the interchange bench to celebrate the achievement.

Records

Other clubs: East Fremantle (61 games, 26 goals).
* Recruited from East Fremantle as part of the West Coast Eagles inaugural squad
*Debuted for East Fremantle v Swan Districts 30/3/1985
*Played his 50th AFL match v Collingwood at Subiaco Oval 11/6/1989
*Played his 100th game v Hawthorn at Subiaco 18/8/1991
*Played his 150th AFL match v Geelong at Kardinia Park 25/6/1994

Awards Honours

East Fremantle premiership player 1985. In 1987 he was the West Coast Eagles rookie of the year and was also third in the club champion award. Three times (1989, 1992 and 1996) he was runner-up in the club champion award. Was selected in the VFL team of the year in 1987 and earned all-Australian honours in 1991 and 1996. In 1991 he was captain of the WA team, which won the national championship. In 1996 he won The West Australian-McInerney Ford footballer of the year award and in 1997 won the best clubman award as well as selection in East Fremantle’s team of the century.

C7 Profile:

A dual premiership player with the West Coast Eagles in the 1990s, Chris Mainwaring served the club superbly after making his AFL debut in its first game back in 1987, and went on to play 201 games in 13 seasons.

Drafted from East Fremantle in the WAFL, Mainwaring quickly established himself as one of the competition's premier players on the wing, having represented Western Australia for the first time in 1985.

Mainwaring helped establish the Eagles as one of the power clubs of the league, particularly in the early to mid-1990s as they won flags in 1992 and 1994, before a serious knee injury ruined his 1997 season.

After completing his rehabilitation Mainwaring returned to the line-up the following year before retiring from the AFL in 1999.

Since then he has worked for Channel Seven as a newsreader and sports reporter, as well as reading sport headlines on Perth radio and also providing special comments during matches played in WA.

His extensive AFL background and intricate knowledge of the game in Perth makes Mainwaring an outstanding person to share his expertise and insights on the league, particularly in his home state.

[frontrow]

So sad, hopefully his family are OK and dealing with this tragedy...

[Skiza]

I couldn't believe it when i saw the headline on fox sports news active... extremely sad...this is from australian-media.com.au

Mainwaring dies
Article by Pun
Reporter, Australian-Media.com.au
October 1 2007, 10:02am AWST

BREAKING NEWS | Channel Seven Perth's weekend sports presenter Chris Mainwaring died this morning after collapsing at home, despite desperate efforts by paramedics to save his life.

Mainwaring was taken from his home in the coastal suburbs of Perth, to Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital, but later died. WA Police wouldn't comment on the cause of death, but it's suspected he died of a heart attack, with some speculation he had a drug overdose.

Mainwaring has presented Weekend sports on TVW7 since he retired from the AFL in 1999 due to a debilitating knee injury, also reading the sports headlines on radio station MIX 94.5 during mornings.

He leaves behind his wife, Rani and two children.

Police will release further details at a conference at 10.30am WST.

[Burgs]

It is a family not unfamiliar with emotional upheaval as this Today Tonight transcript relates.
Chris' brother Brett and his family is very well known through the Southern Pastoral Region and the Bush Racing Circuit and of course Chris was known to many in the bush too.

Amazing Brett

Reporter: Andrea Burns

Brett says “I got into a dive and I couldn't get out of it”

Chris says “I probably used Brett as a bit of an inspiration throughout my football career”

Brett says “it just happened too quick, before you knew it, it was all over”

Chris says “when I saw the state that Brett was in, I actually walked out of the room within 10 seconds and burst into tears out in the corridor”

The plane crash that inspired an AFL legend...

Brett says “I just remember the ground coming at me pretty quick”

Brett Mainwaring is Chris Mainwaring's big brother.

Chris, the Eagles hero...

Brett, the hero's hero.

Brett's a farmer.

... And as private as Chris is public...

But they're close... very close.

as you'd expect, when one of them should be dead.

Brett says “October 15 was the day, 1986. Yeah it was a good morning, nice fresh clean morning”

In WA's dusty north, big paddocks, ten thousand acres, and a single engined cessna, and a day that changed the lives of the whole Mainwaring family.

Brett shouldn't have been in the sky, but he was helping a mate spot sheep. was alone in his plane in the air ... motorbike riders in radio contact, down below.

“cause you can see a lot more from the air than you can on the ground - cause there's a lot of creeks running through the actual paddock we were doing and what you do is you fly around, spot the sheep, then you call up the bloke on a motorbike to go and tackle them sheep, keep them moving, we all try and get them in one direction”

It was around six in the morning; Brett had been in the air half an hour...

“what happened, I spotted some sheep in a creek and they weren't moving and I put the bikes onto them but the bikes were further away, so I went over to have another go at em, with the roar of the aeroplane they usually move off”

This day became anything but usual...

Brett says “it appears to me, I don't know, like a gust of wind got the outside top of me wing on the right hand side of the aeroplane”

The experienced pilot had stalled the plane...

A warning alarm ... “the left hand wing wasn't actually flying”

no time to feel scared..the aircraft dropped like a stone.

The impact was devastating the plane crumpled like alfoil, wings ripped off.

Brett Mainwairing was trapped and horribly injured

His legs were through the fuselage

His face smashed his bones shattered

his bottom lip torn off.

Brett Mainwaring was badly injured, but he was alive.

The motorbike riders spotted the smoke from the smashed plane and rushed to help their broken mate.

Doctor Ron Jewell was then the Carnarvon District Medical Officer - this, the first air crash he'd ever attended, is seared into his memory

No ambulance, the doctor was flown, then driven over rough paddocks, in a ute to the crash scene.

Doctor Ron Jewell says “He had horrendous facial injuries, his face was very distorted and his femur, his thigh was very obviously distorted and we could see what we had to do from that point on”

A broken thigh bone was causing internal bleeding. Dr Jewell had to resuscitate Brett, putting in an iv line, in the dust. A nerve block helped dull the excruciating pain from the many other broken bones.

Loaded back into the ute, the race was on to get Brett to hospital...

Dr Jewell remembers the trip as surreal... hearing children doing lessons on the ute two-way, as he pumped fluids into his badly injured patient

Stabilised in Carnarvon, his bottom lip sown back on, Brett was then airlifted to Perth. for the first time, doctors were able to make a full assessment of his horrible injuries.

Broken wrist

A Broken thigh bone - would he walk again?

Broken ribs... At the base of his spine, a broken coccyx... broken jaw, shattered cheekbones.

Leah Mainwaring only knew it was Brett because she recognised not her son's face, but his feet.

“I don't know if it's just a mother's instinct, she knows what their feet are like and their body”

The first sight of his damaged son was too much for Brett's Dad, Hub. “I only stayed about half an hour, then I trundled off back, I couldn't um, I couldn't hack it”

For Chris, everything changed. “His eyes were stitched closed, his lip was completely gone, his leg was all crunched up and bones - it's not a sight you want to see any family member in”

And so started the hard road back for Brett, a rehabilitation that was gruelling. His face rebuilt with one of these

Brett says “I think I got down to about 37 kilos in hospital cos me jaws were wired and they couldn't feed me,, so ended up just knocking a few teeth out so they could make a square so they could pump soup n that down to me chips”

Chris says “for him to have been told you may not be able to walk, you may not be to this that would have been red rag to a bull, that's the sort of person Brett is...

But I do remember going over to Shenton Park and seeing him having to learn to walk again and all that and seeing the pain and you know he'll never tell you about it, he'll never tell you what pain he goes through - that's not Brett”

Sister Wendy and other brother Glenn, also great support... they'd played together as kids they now pulled together.

Hospital was tough, but Brett who could so easily have been killed in the October smash, was home for Christmas, and Chris' 21st.

Chris says “if someone walked in an saw someone in the state that he was in and to say that he was going to be at your 21st 10 weeks later, you would have said absolutely no way - and he was there, I still remember him being there”

The man who shouldn't have walked, was even racing horses - here, the winning jockey.

Incredibly, twelve months to the day... , Brett's wife gave birth to their son Stephen - delivered by Dr Jewell, the doctor who'd help save Brett's life.

Little brother Chris certainly knows the highs and lows himself, suffering more pain than most footy stars. But it was his big brother's grit that pulled him through the bad times. “it's always been in the back of my mind that every time that I think I'm going through a hardship, here I was playing football and I've had injuries - it was always easier to remind myself of what he went through”

Brett Mainwaring's a tough, country bloke. You get the feeling the crash still haunts him, but going on about it isn't his way.... there's work to be done, “no good whinging about it”

Chris what is it about this guy that makes him so special?

“Well he's alive, that's the first thing, we're all pretty happy to have him still around”

Leah says “we are grateful he's alive - and to all those people who helped him at the time, we're very grateful”

Whether it's working, or sharing a beer, the Mainwaring brothers know now every minute counts.

Incredibly, flying remains part of Brett's life - if this is his second chance, he's not wasting it... like the Eagles, like his little brother, he's flying high...

Brett says “I'll put it to you this way, you're up in the air, its open spaces... just freedom”

[Jehna]

OMG this is terrible....I was out in Cott last night and actually saw the ambo come twice but i had no idea what it was for...i presume now it was this. I was so shocked when i woke up to this news this morning.

What a terrible thing for the family, for the Eagles and for AFL football.

[jono]

shit.
thats tragic.

[jono]

from the eagles website:

Former Eagle passes away
12:47 PM Mon 1 October, 2007 | Back


Exclusive to AFL BigPond Network

News
DUAL West Coast premiership player Chris Mainwaring has passed away, aged 41.

The 201-game midfielder died of a heart attack in Perth early on Monday morning.

He was a member of the 1992 and 1994 Eagles premiership teams and was an All-Australian representative in 1991 and 1996.

Mainwaring was rushed to hospital on Monday morning after collapsing at his home in Cottesloe.

He is survived by his wife Rani and two children.

Mainwaring was an inaugural member of the Eagles’ squad in 1987 and was part of the club’s first Grand Final in 1991.

Runner-up in the Eagles' best and fairest three times and third on two occasions, he played eight state of origin matches for Western Australia.

Since his retirement in 1999, he has worked for Channel Seven in Perth as a newsreader and sports reporter, as well as working on Perth radio.

Mainwaring was a member of the 2007 AFL All-Australian selection committee alongside Gerard Healy, Kevin Bartlett, Rod Austin, Robert Walls and Mark Bickley.

[RuckNMaul]

Condolences to the Mainwaring family on a terrible loss. 41 is too young to die.
a great man in WA footy history i met him when i was in primary school as the Eagles were first starting up. he always had a smile on his face.


(i told you jehna has all the connections, she's growing into an eyewitness next!!!)

[Jehna]

(i told you jehna has all the connections, she's growing into an eyewitness next!!!)

I don't think me being boozed in Cott counts as a connection haha. Though my dad works at Charlies so perhaps I can use that connection...
___________________________________________
From Foxsports

Ex-Eagles star Mainwaring dead
October 01, 2007

FORMER West Coast AFL premiership player and media personality Chris Mainwaring has died in Perth.

Police and the St John Ambulance were called to Mainwaring's home in the beach suburb of Cottesloe following a complaint he was yelling in the street at 11.45pm (WST) yesterday.

When they arrived, the 41-year-old was calm and refused help from the ambulance officers who left him in the care of a neighbour, police said.
St John Ambulance was again called to Mainwaring's home 45 minutes later at 12.30am today where officers found him unconscious.

He was taken to Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital where he was pronounced dead a short time later. Police will investigate the death and prepare a report for the coroner.

Mainwaring was an inaugural Eagles squad member who played 201 games from 1987 to 1999. The wingman was part of the club's first grand final in 1991, and was a key member of the side that won the Eagles' first two premierships in 1992 and 1994.

He was runner-up in the Eagles' best and fairest three times and came third on two occasions. Mainwaring was an All-Australian in 1991 and 1996. The club was not commenting this morning.

Since retiring, he worked for the Seven Network in Perth as a newsreader and sports reporter, as well as working on Perth radio.

The Seven Network also aired a statement in its morning news bulletins confirming Mainwaring's death.

AAP

[gotheforce]

damn. thats pretty tragic. And so young too.

I read somewhere that he was actually supposed to fight in a chrity kickboxing match against Justin Langer soon. I think it was on the Main Game yesterday.

[shasta]

This is just terrible news.

I've never really cottoned-on to AFL, even after 30 years in WA. But I used to watch it more often in the pre-Foxtel years and I really admired this bloke a lot. All class. All guts. Never met him but he seemed one of the genuinely likable characters.

RIP.

[Jehna]

I read somewhere that he was actually supposed to fight in a chrity kickboxing match against Justin Langer soon. I think it was on the Main Game yesterday.

Yeah you're right gtf. It was in yesterday's paper that there was supposed to be a charity fight at challenge stadium on thursday night for the telethon appeal...

[.X.]

A sad loss.

I went to Primary School at the same time as Chris back in Geraldton.

He was about 4 years ahead of me. I remember him as the captain of our team for the Athletics Carnival, and then as I got older and the Eagles were created we were proud as punch as Chris and Murray Wrenstead (sp?) were selected to play for the Eagles as they were Geraldton born players.

Watching the 92 and 94 Grand Finals in the Northern Territory I would tell anyone who would listen that "I went to Primary School with that guy". Of course if we were to pass each other on the street I could guarantee he wouldn't have a clue who I am.

To the Mainwaring family my deepest condolences.

[Goldmember]

Some memories from a great man who made his mark in the world. All the best to his family.