Posted online: Aug 10th, 2010

By Michelle McKenna
Reporter
A WOMAN is fighting for life after plunging from the second storey window of a city centre flat in while onlookers watched in horror.
The incident happened shortly after 4.30pm on Saturday afternoon in Shipquay Street.
An ambulance arrived on the scene minutes later after a member of the public raised the alarm.
She was taken to Altnagelvin Hospital but was later transferred to the Intensive Care Unit at the Royal Victoria Hospital, where a spokesperson for the Belfast Trust last night described her condition as ‘critical’.
Speaking to the Derry News just after the injured woman was rushed to hospital Frances McDermott, who works nearby described hearing a loud smash after the woman plummeted to the ground.
“I heard the loud thump as she hit the light and as the billboard crashed to the ground,” she said.
Two visitors to the city from Co Meath, who did not wish to be named, also relived the moment they saw the stricken woman lying on the ground.
“We had just come out of a café and heard an awful bang and turned around to see a woman lying only about six feet away from us,” the man said.
“She was breathing and her eyelids were flickering but there was blood coming from her ears.”
The PSNI then cordoned off the upper Shipquay Street area for a number of hours to allow a forensics team to examine the scene.
“The partial closure had been in place after police responded to a report of a person in distress in the (Shipquay Street) area,” the PSNI spokesperson said.