Schoolgirl, 14, loses finger jumping fence while escaping isolation with pals

Tia Meggett, 14, escaped isolation with three other girls at The Gainsborough Academy on October 18 and didn’t realise she had lost her finger until friends pointed out she was bleeding

Tia Meggett lost her right-hand ring finger when she jumped a fence escaping isolation with her friends (

Image: Nicola Kelly / MEN Media)

A teenage girl has lost her finger after jumping a school fence.

Tia Meggett, 14, escaped isolation at The Gainsborough Academy on October 18 with three other girls.

They managed to leave the unit through a fire exit and jump a fence, but Tia caught her right-hand ring finger as she did, LincolnshireLive reports.

Once she made it to the other side, Tia’s friends says she was bleeding and when she looked down she saw her finger missing.

The school says it is now “reviewing its procedures” in light of the horrifying incident.

Mum Nicola Kelly said: “It was at about 10am that this happened and the school rang me at around 11.30am.

The Gainsborough Academy is now ‘reviewing its procedures’
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Image:

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“They said that something had happened to Tia but that she would only need a few stitches.

“So my neighbour took me down to the school straight away and when I got there, Tia was in the back of a teacher’s car with her hand in the air.

“The headteacher was there and they just passed me a bowl that had bags of frozen sweetcorn in it and when I lifted the bags up, Tia’s finger was there.

“I don’t know whether what they told me on the phone was just so I didn’t panic or what, but it was quite obviously going to be more than a few stitches.”

The school said they called an ambulance but they said the wait would take too long. Nicola then accompanied the teachers who drove Tia to Lincoln County Hospital.

Tia was eventually transferred to the Royal Derby Hospital she underwent an operation to have her finger amputated on October 20.

Nicola added: “When I first saw her at the school she was just in a complete state of shock I think.

“She’s doing as well as she can do now in the circumstances, but I’m not going to be sending her back to the school.

“There’s a video that has been going around of when she jumped the fence and there have been some nasty comments that she just doesn’t need.

“So the school have loaned her a laptop and I’m going to see if I can work out some sort of arrangement with them for her to be taught at home.

“My main issue is how she and the other girls managed to get out of the school, and what this teacher in their classroom was actually doing if they managed to get out of the fire exit.

“I’m not happy with them at all and I think there are so many ways that they could have handled this better and more sensitively.

“Tia’s now having to adapt to not having one of her fingers and she was a teenager girl who liked painting her nails and everything – so this is really upsetting.”

Martin Smith, the assistant director for education at Lincolnshire County Council, said: “The academy has informed us of the incident, which we realise has been upsetting for the family.

“We understand that the academy is investigating the circumstances behind the incident and reviewing its procedures.”

A spokesperson for the council said that the school would have to provide any further information, but that they were not sure if they would do so whilst their investigation was still live.