Britain's most badly burned woman feels lucky to be alive and helping patients like her

On her worst days, Catrin Pugh still can’t always face the world – strangers staring at her scars in the street and even occasionally asking: “What the hell happened to you?” But 12 years on from the most terrible day of her life, it’s slowly getting easier. The 31-year-old, who holds the unenviable “title” of Britain’s worst ever burns survivor, has a satisfying career and a loving boyfriend. She can walk and work and, mostly, face the world.

“I still have times when I’m back there, lying by the road on fire, waiting for help. Something will trigger the memory and for a few minutes I am back there,” she tells me. “I don’t have memories of seeing the fire itself. I felt it and I heard it hissing, fizzing. My memory is of crawling up the [coach] aisle, knowing I was on fire.”

Catrin, then 19, was with a group of five friends, on a gap year, and was returning home after an enjoyable ski season in the French Alps in 2013. But the brakes failed on the coach she was travelling in and rather than go over a cliff edge, its driver, Maurice Wrightson, 63, crashed into rocks on a hairpin road and burst into flames.

Everyone on board managed to escape, mostly with relatively minor injuries, but courageous Maurice died and was posthumously awarded the Queen’s Commendation for Bravery. Catrin suffered third-degree burns on 96% of her body during the crash – just the soles of her feet and scalp were spared.

She only survived because her then boyfriend, Shaun, managed to drag her out. After three months in a coma and 200 operations and skin grafts, she awoke to find her life had changed beyond recognition. That she woke up at all was a miracle in itself, having been given only a one in a 1,000 chance of survival.

“I had times when I didn’t want to go on, trying to see what life would be like for me now, knowing I would be forever judged by the way I looked,” she says.

Twelve years on, she works as a physiotherapist for the Katie Piper Foundation, launched by the inspirational acid attack survivor, helping other burn patients regain their mobility and flexibility, in some cases literally learning to walk again and, hopefully, regain their independence.

Catrin, from Wrexham, North Wales, graduated from university in 2021 and began her new post as in-house physiotherapist at the charity’s rehabilitation centre on Merseyside, where survivors spend several days accessing a range of therapies, including emotional as well as physical support. She works with her patients online and face to face.

She also regularly models for photoshoots to showcase her differences, is a motivational speaker and fundraiser and continues to challenge society’s attitudes to people with visible differences.

“Before the accident, I had wanted to train in musical theatre but I am passionate about what I do now,” she says.

“It was terrifying going on a dating app and those fears weren’t irrational, because some people said some awful things,” she says. “Romance and dating when you have visible differences is very difficult. For years, I just didn’t.

“For a start, I was bald because they had to shave my head, and hair is so important to a woman.”

But then Catrin met Luke, who works in musical theatre. The couple live together in London with their dog and hope to start a family in the future. Catrin is still in touch with the five friends from that fateful day, but not ex-boyfriend Shaun.