A prayer I composed for him, posted it at www.finalgear.com

Dear God,

Please give Richard the strength to recover quickly from his injuries he sustained.
May your grace and inexhaustable mercy be with him at this time of need, and to watch over him as he recovers from his injuries.
Please give his wife Amanda, his two daughters and his many family and friends the power of hope in Richards time of need.
In your all mighty power, we ask this of you.

Amen.


Hang in there, hampster! You have proven again and again you're as tough as nails.

Lack of words...

Update: Apparently Richard Hammond wanted the filmers to carry on filming so he could do a report in the helicopter, he wasn't allowed though. Jeremy also said that he made a joke insulting his driving and Hammond smiled. That must also mean that in the night he has been awake again.
Jeremy also says that the only visible injury he has is a black eye. My dad reckons that Richard possibly won't be on TV again because he could quite possibly be in a wheelchair. He also said, because people are complaining about the things included on the show that Top Gear could be scrapped forever. I'm going to think differently to my dad, just to be on a positive note. Top Gear is due to start again on October 8th. Don't know if it will though.

He was obviously competent and confident because he'd done several runs before this one.

I can't understand or believe the suggested cause for the crash though. Parachutes are notoriously temperamental in terms of whether they'll open or not. It seems like it would be a massive design flaw to attach the chutes in such a way that if one does not open, or takes longer than the other to open, the car will become unstable.

Quote from sinbad :

It seems like it would be a massive design flaw to attach the chutes in such a way that if one does not open, or takes longer than the other to open, the car will become unstable.

My thoughts exactly!!

From b3ta (I think it's funny, and I'm sure Hamster would too, so I have no qualms posting it here)

Quote from tristancliffe :

From b3ta (I think it's funny, and I'm sure Hamster would too, so I have no qualms posting it here)

Clarkson = Funny in an idiot way.

Quote from sinbad :

He was obviously competent and confident because he'd done several runs before this one.

I can't understand or believe the suggested cause for the crash though. Parachutes are notoriously temperamental in terms of whether they'll open or not. It seems like it would be a massive design flaw to attach the chutes in such a way that if one does not open, or takes longer than the other to open, the car will become unstable.

Apparently a tyre blew out. Nothing to do with the parachute. There's only 1 parachute on the Vampire anyway. Hamster has now moved out of intensive care and into a high dependancy unit. At least we know it's not touch and go to whether he'll die now.

Quote from nutty boy :

Hamster has not moved out of intensive care and into a high dependancy unit. At least we know it's not touch and go to whether he'll die now.

Where do you get your info from?

I think it's a spelling mistake.. "not" should be "now".

Hamster is now out of the ICU, but he's been moved to a HDU, which is still pretty intense medicine. For example, people who have quadruple heart bypasses will be moved from the operating theatre to ICU, but will only stay there for the first 24hrs on average. They're then moved to HDU for a few days, before being moved to the ward.

[edit] Just for the sake of clarity, Hamster isn't necessarily out of danger. ICU really is INTENSIVE care, but High Dependency also really means he's highly dependent on machinery at this point. What the recovery prospects are, really can't be even guessed at, at this point. We just have to continue to hope, and have faith.

[edit again, to save posting] He's now reported to be (or recently have been) conscious and speaking to family. James May says "The Hammond I know is in there, and intact" or words to that effect.

I hope he will be better soon!

Pull Through Hamster!

Quote from SamH :

[edit again, to save posting] He's now reported to be (or recently have been) conscious and speaking to family. James May says "The Hammond I know is in there, and intact" or words to that effect.

Great News! Hope this is true.

Quote from tristancliffe :

From b3ta (I think it's funny, and I'm sure Hamster would too, so I have no qualms posting it here)

Uhh, b3ta always has such a bad taste, just gotta love it
Anyway, good that hamster is doing better already

Quote from SamH :

James May says "The Hammond I know is in there, and intact" or words to that effect.

yes! so he is alive and the same person!

!Donations of a pound a second holy cow!!!

Quote from Stew2000 :

Clarkson = Funny in an idiot way.

Clarkson = Idiot in an idiot way...

Quote from CSU1 :

!Donations of a pound a second holy cow!!!

Donation page

They've collected over £30k since I saw it yesterday :wow:

Quote from whitey6272 :

Clarkson = Idiot in an idiot way...

I missed that, why?

He is out of intesive care!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/5371556.stm

Good progress!!!

Quote from X-Ter :

He is out of intesive care!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/5371556.stm

Good progress!!!

I love good news!!!

Quote :

Mr Clarkson told the Sun newspaper that he had insulted Mr Hammond's driving skills - prompting a smile from Mr Hammond.

That just gives me a fuzzy feeling inside.
THE DRIVING GOD'S BACK!

Quote from nutty boy :

Update: Apparently Richard Hammond wanted the filmers to carry on filming so he could do a report in the helicopter, he wasn't allowed though. Jeremy also said that he made a joke insulting his driving and Hammond smiled. That must also mean that in the night he has been awake again.
Jeremy also says that the only visible injury he has is a black eye. My dad reckons that Richard possibly won't be on TV again because he could quite possibly be in a wheelchair. He also said, because people are complaining about the things included on the show that Top Gear could be scrapped forever. I'm going to think differently to my dad, just to be on a positive note. Top Gear is due to start again on October 8th. Don't know if it will though.

TG will go back on the air.

TG's safety record is better than most starts in LFS, every risk is a calculated one and occasionally bad things happen (Hammond tipping his van over in the last series for example). Considering some of the stunts they've done before you'd expect worse things to have happened to them before.

No point taking a show off the air on the back of one accident that could of happened to anybody regardless whether their name is Richard Hammond or The Stig.

Just to point out that the van tipping was done on purpose. Unless he's a TERRIBLE driver, he wouldn't have done a perfect Scandinavian Flick without meaning to. And somehow I just knew before he even started braking that it would fall over, as it was the funniest thing possible (which is the entire point of TG).

Quote from PCCD :

(Hammond tipping his van over in the last series for example).

He knew that was gonna happen

But's it's good to hear he's getting better.

Bad example of something going wrong then.