VANCOUVER, B.C. - The horror was captured forever on amateur video.
On a gorgeous summer day, a hot air balloon, fully ablaze, plummeted to the ground in suburban Vancouver with a woman and her daughter still on board.
Moments earlier, several others managed to jump out before the balloon lifted off, a raging inferno after one of its propane tanks exploded.
One survivor who was unable to jump estimated later that she fell five storeys. Others scrambled over the side of the basket before it became airborne, heroically pushing and pulling others out of the basket, but suffering terrible burns.
The balloon subsequently crashed into a mobile home park, destroying several homes and causing more injuries.
Two women were killed and 11 others were injured in the August 2007 accident.
Among them was Lyse Cantin and Linda Enns, partners of 28 years.
They were on hand this week to present Vancouver General Hospital with a $15,000 donation for a piece of equipment that Cantin believes may have saved her life, and certainly got her out of the hospital earlier.
"It was my birthday present," Cantin said of the balloon ride she was on that tragic day, which left her with second-and third-degree burns over 25 per cent of her body.
She spent a month in the burn unit.
"The burn unit is a horrible place," she said. "The smell is enough to gag a maggot."
But Cantin said the month she spent recovering could have been much longer, were it not for a piece of high-tech machinery that actually sits idle most of the time.
The lack of funding for the equipment prompted her and her partner Enns to want to do something. Enns is the executive-director of the Vancouver Executives Association, which raised the money.
Burn specialist Dr. Anthony Papp said the donation will allow him to resume hydrosurgeries using a piece of technology called Versajet.
Papp used the technique many times in his native Finland, but Cantin was his first patient after two years of practising at Vancouver General.
The machine looks like a shoe box, with tubes protruding. One tube carries saline water under pressure, essentially acting like a scalpel. The pressurized water cuts through the dead skin, while another tube sucks it away.
However, the machine mostly sits mothballed at the hospital's burn unit because it's expensive to operate and isn't covered by the B.C. government.
"Its (use) is very widespread in Europe and in the U.S. but not in Canada," said Papp. "I don't think any Canadian burn unit uses it on a regular basis."
Peter Gardner, national sales manager for Smith and Nephew, which sells Versajet in Canada, estimated there are about 20 in Canada. But he was unable to say to what extent they are used.
At Children's Hospital in Vancouver, for example, it's being tested free, compliments of the manufacturer who hopes the hospital will eventually purchase a unit.
The console, a one-time purchase, costs about $20,000, but the individual hand pieces that use pressurized saline water to cut through dead, rotting skin, go for $500 apiece and can only be used once.
Anna Marie d'Angelo, spokeswoman for the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority, said the agency is examining the system.
"We are building a business case for it and will present it to the Health Ministry," she said.
She suggested one reason it's not funded is that there are other long-established methods for treating burn patients.
But Papp said it's "frustrating to know that we have these tools available and then the hospital says, 'Sorry, no money. Try to find it somewhere else."'
Hydrosurgery isn't for everyone but it can make some burns heal faster with fewer dressing changes, less pain with less scarring. It also allows patients to get out of hospital sooner, he said.
Canada, he said, is lagging behind in its burn treatment
The aftermath of the balloon crash is still before the courts.
Last September, the Transportation Safety Board issued a scathing report on the incident that found the balloon had numerous safety issues.
The report said the issues might have been uncovered by Transport Canada but there was no requirement for inspections of hot-air balloons.
A lawsuit filed by some survivors of the crash names the company and owner of the balloon and other defendants.
The crash is still being reviewed by the RCMP and Transport Canada, said Cpl. Roger Morrow.
Cantin, Enns and Justine Johnson, the daughter of one of the crash victims, plan to file their own lawsuit in the coming weeks.
Cantin's scars are still visible on her left arm as well as her back, buttocks and waist are still scarred.
She and Enns have received counselling but Cantin said she still has nightmares.
Papp said the scars will lighten with each passing year, and that will help Cantin's overall healing.
"The mental scarring is less because you don't have to deal with the scars all your life," said Cantin.
