I watched moment Dancing on Ice’s Greg Rutherford suffered excruciating injury – he screamed in agony on the floor
COLIN Grafton has spoken out about what it was like being on the rink when Dancing on Ice star Greg Rutherford was horrifically injured just hours before the finale.
The professional skater rejoined the cast of the iconic show for its 16th series, and was partnered up with Claire Sweeney.
Unfortunately the Brookside actress and her partner were the third ones in the competition to get the axe.
However, Colin stayed on until the end to help assist other stars with their routines.
He was set to participate in the final skate off as part of a trio alongside fellow pro Brendyn Hatfield and retired track athlete Greg.
All three men were practising a sequence that involved Greg sliding through Brendyn and Colin’s legs when disaster struck.
The move went horribly wrong and the 37-year-old ended up tearing his abdominal muscles.
He had to be rushed to hospital where he was operated on and left immobile for several days.
Colin reflected on the incident in an exclusive interview with the Sun, saying: “To give you some backstory on this, we were all so excited.
“The first half was a trio performance between Greg, myself, and Brendan Hatfield. We were three sailors.
“I obviously had a really close bond with Greg throughout the series, and Vanessa James, his partner.
“We were just so excited to skate that routine with them because it was the finals.
“It was devastating when it happened, and it was quite traumatic, because it was in the morning of the day of.
“It’s the final week, it’s the final performance of the show, so energies are high.
“This was just our first or second run through in the morning.
” And yeah, he dove through my legs, and one of the other pros, Brendan Hatfield, and we just knew.
“He was in excruciating, excruciating pain. It was hard to watch.
“Everybody was literally saying prayers in the ring. It really affected everyone in the whole venue. It was hard to kind of pull everything together after that.”
Colin immediately noticed that something was wrong with Greg and raced to alert the production team.
The skating champ grimaced: “He screamed a little bit, and his facial expressions, and, you know, he was just kind of lying there, and I had to say stop the music. It wasn’t great.”
However, he has applauded the Dancing on Ice crew for managing to get the show off the ground despite the terrifying incident.
“Amazing paramedic team, and everybody swiftly took care of him,” he added.
“He was off to the hospital quickly, and then he sent us all a beautiful video message saying, thank you guys, you know, for caring.
“I have to give my props to everyone involved; production, and creative team, and everyone, because everyone just pulled it together. It ended up being a wonderful show that night, with such a little turnaround time.”
Despite the skating scare, Colin shared that he is ‘definitely open’ to being invited back for another season of Dancing on Ice.
The American pro, who has been taking to the rink since he was seven years old, is also jetting off to Japan at the start of June to take part live show Fantasy On Ice.
The annual figure skating festival will see Olympic skaters from around the world take their performances on tour to four major Japanese cities.
Colin will be skating alongside Cirque du Soliel star Nobahar Dadui.