September 9, 2026 • 10 mins
Rob & daughter Molly talk us through an horrific injury that turned into something miraculous...
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Rob and Kip and Corey Oates in the morning.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
We want your amazing stories. You can go to the
website kiss97. com. au and tell us all about it, which is
exactly what Rob and his daughter Molly did.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Hey, guys.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Hello. Hello.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hello.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
Hello. Hello, Dad. I've got my three musketeers, have I? Hey, Roy.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Yeah, me too, Rob.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
And Robin and Oatsy.
Speaker 4 (00:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Yes.
Speaker 5 (00:24):
I told you not to get starstruck, Dad.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Now, Molly, we got like about a 20-second version of
this story a while ago, but we were like, no,
this needs a proper platform.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
So tell us your amazing story. And it involves your dad, Rob,
who's on the phone now.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
From my understanding, you were just a child when this happened.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
Yeah, I was.
Speaker 4 (00:46):
So I was pretty much just about to turn five.
It happened on the 23rd of December, 2003. So I
was two months away from being five years old. And
every year we would do a barbecue with my godparents
and Dad decided he'd go and get new gas bottles
(01:06):
since we were going to have a barbecue. He ends
up going, my sister and I, who she would have
been about 12 at the time, she and I were
just constantly on his back, like, going, we want to
come too, we want to come too. Like, we always
went going in the car with Dad.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Sure.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
Luckily, mum distracted us and said, no, dad, run, you
can go. So he goes off with the gas bottles,
swaps them over, and as he's going into Bell Street
to sort of go back home and bring the new
gas bottles home, one of the gas bottles leaked. and
ended up exploding in the back of the car.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
What?
Speaker 4 (01:43):
In the back of his station wagon. He just heard
a hissing noise and sort of looked around and saw
that one of them was leaking and said, yep, time
to put the window down. And that's ultimately what ended
up saving his life because he was able to get
out of the car. Yeah, ended up just outside Ipswich
train station and the car was just completely engulfed. And,
(02:05):
you know, Dad was all... covered in burns and um
i think to my recollection it was 70 percent.
Speaker 5 (02:14):
Okay about this time i feel like we should bring
robin yes first of all i'd like to say isn't
it great.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
You didn't go molly yeah yeah yeah that's.
Speaker 4 (02:23):
Something we're really really happy with especially my mom she
was like well you know i would have would have
lost them all and Luckily, everyone survived because, you know,
we were able to, you know, mum was able to
control us and dad was able to, you know, focus
on saving himself rather than because there's no way he
would have left the car if we were in there.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
Yes. Wow.
Speaker 4 (02:45):
We would have all been gone.
Speaker 5 (02:46):
Okay, Rob, let's take us to the moment where you're
hearing the hissing and you realise something is wrong. What
happened after that?
Speaker 3 (02:55):
It was down in Ipswich. I'm coming along the river
road and I hear this hissing and I go, hang on,
that's not right. So I've done a shoulder turn to
the left. I've seen some vapour coming out of this
bottle and I thought, oh. So I thought, I'll wind
the window down because I thought, well, there's plenty of
parking at the railway. I'll stop there. Going around the
(03:17):
second roundabout, it just exploded.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
Whoa. Do you know what the spark was?
Speaker 3 (03:22):
They tell me that it all happens under the seat
with these newfangled window winders and new cars. All the
stuff you've got is under your seat. And because LPG
is a heavy gas, it doesn't go up, it goes down.
So it's gone down and something's happened with the electrics
and it's gone up.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
So you putting.
Speaker 5 (03:41):
The window down sparked the explosion?
Speaker 3 (03:44):
Well, apparently, yes.
Speaker 5 (03:46):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
But, whoa.
Speaker 5 (03:48):
Otherwise, you could gas yourself to death.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Now, there's an alternative.
Speaker 3 (03:50):
There's your option. Bear in mind, it's a 42-degree day,
two days before Christmas, and so you think, okay, I've
got the air conditioner going, and I thought, well, I'm
going to need a window open here because I'm going
to have to get out or I'm going to have
to let the gas out.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
If you can hear the gas, that's a big leak
if you can hear it coming out.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Yeah. Have they said how it started just leaking randomly?
Speaker 3 (04:14):
I believe that it's all about the gas expanding in
the tank. It was sitting on a hot platform against
a hot wall when I picked it up.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
Yeah, and now it's in the air conditioning of your
car and.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
You're moving around. That's exactly right. And I don't know
what that does inside a gas bottle, but it didn't
do much good that day.
Speaker 5 (04:35):
You two are hilarious.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
You're getting crazy.
Speaker 5 (04:38):
You're caught into the logistics rather.
Speaker 3 (04:40):
Than the fact that.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
I'm stunned by... What about those little plastic caps that
are always in them? Aren't they there to stop the leaking?
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Yeah, the little yellow screw cap now was developed after
my accident. Whoa!
Speaker 4 (04:50):
Yeah, that's what happened because of Dad.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
That's incredible.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
That safeguard now that we all have every time you
pick up a swap and go, that's because you nearly
blew up.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (05:01):
And when I.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
When I.
Yes, it got me there.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
Oh.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
Oh, God. Sorry, mate. Sorry, mate.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Do you know what?
Speaker 5 (05:14):
Let's give you a couple of moments to regroup, Rob,
and then let's come back.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
Yeah, it's okay. I was just going to say the
policeman that came and saw me in hospital only goes
to fatals, apparently.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
They said about five seconds. They said another five seconds
in the car. And he'd be gone. Wow.
Speaker 5 (05:36):
But you got out, and you got out, and you
were on fire.
Speaker 3 (05:39):
I was actually pulled out of a car.
Speaker 5 (05:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
If you can imagine, and this is where I get
really interested, because the car exploded, the window was down,
and I put my arms out.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
Do you want me to go, Dad? Go on, Molly. So, essentially,
he put his arms out, and... Usually when you think
of someone trying to get out a window, you see
them sort of shoulder first or sort of climbing their
way out. But it was almost like he was being pulled.
He was being pulled out of the car, even though
(06:15):
there wasn't anyone there. He remembers being pulled out of
the car. Like you don't get out of a car
that way.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
I hadn't undone the seatbelt. I hadn't put the car
in park. I hadn't done anything. I put my arms
out the window. And you know the rest.
Speaker 4 (06:31):
And out he went.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Wow.
Speaker 5 (06:33):
Okay, what do you think that was, Rob?
Speaker 3 (06:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (06:36):
Something greater than you?
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Is that what you're saying? Yeah.
Speaker 5 (06:38):
Oh, yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Like a spirit or something?
Speaker 3 (06:41):
Yeah, a God moment. Someone was looking after me.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
Wow. A God moment.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
It was all caught on camera. They say that in
one of the camera angles you can actually see someone.
See someone?
Speaker 5 (06:54):
You are meant to be here. So what is it
over the last 23 years? that has happened that you
feel that's part of why you're still here. And I
know for a fact you changed laws around gas bottles.
You are meant to be here.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
My friend.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (07:13):
100%.
Speaker 5 (07:14):
Absolutely. So that, I mean, I've got goosebumps all over
my body because it's these stories that make other people
think and believe about greater things than themselves. And that
is wonderful. But let's go back to you're now, What, 70%
burns to your body?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
If you can imagine, the bottle was in the back
of the car. The explosion shot through from the console
to the windscreen and back into my face from the windscreen.
Speaker 1 (07:40):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
So it hit my arm on the way through and
then hit my face and the rest of my body
on the way back.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
Where are you burnt?
Speaker 5 (07:47):
All up and down your arms, your.
Speaker 3 (07:49):
Legs, your face? The left arm had a skin graft. Mm-hmm.
And my face was, my hair was burnt off. And
my wife was concerned about my ears being burnt off.
And she said, how's he going to hold his sunglasses on?
I wasn't burnt on the chest, but I was burnt
(08:11):
around the back of the neck and on the face.
And they're still there today. And they're with me all
the time now. And you look at it and you
can't forget it. But it's just part of who I
am now, you know.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Hey, Rob, so this story is from December 23, 2003.
So 23 years ago. And yet you nearly broke down
or you did break down a couple of minutes ago.
Speaker 3 (08:34):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
What is it that gets you when you retell this story?
Speaker 3 (08:37):
I'm an emotional person most of the time. Molly will
tell you, I can't watch a movie, I can't watch
a soppy movie without having a tear.
Speaker 5 (08:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
For three weeks there in hospital, I had a face
the size of a basketball and my eyes were closed
and all puffed up and everything. It was fairly intense.
And there were times when you get a bit of
anxiety out of it.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
So is it the fear of the moment or is
it the way you feel now, whether it's blessed or
lucky to be alive?
Speaker 3 (09:07):
I'm glad to be here. I'm lucky to be here. But,
I mean, I had a lot of help. There was
a lot of help. I couldn't have done all this
on my own. And those three weeks were just horrendous.
Speaker 4 (09:22):
I just remember, like, my mum would have to do
the dressings every morning and every afternoon and just fresh
new dressings. And I thought, God, the burns weren't even
half of it. It was the recovery. And it's so
great to have a dad who is so... emotional. We
don't have men who show their emotion enough. And I
(09:43):
think getting his story out there, it shows that you
can get through it. If my dad can get through
what he got through, anyone can.
Speaker 5 (09:53):
Well, I feel like this is a $ 500 story.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Right there. It is. Yeah, I believe so.
Speaker 5 (09:58):
And I feel like this should be something that you
guys can go and celebrate as a family, maybe go
and have a great meal or do something together, whatever
you want to do, Rob.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
I think that's a great idea. As long as we
don't have a barbecue.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
I was going to say, stay away from teppanyaki grills, Rob.
Speaker 4 (10:13):
We'll let someone else have.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
A barbecue, hey?
Speaker 3 (10:16):
Thank you for letting me tell the story.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
Mate, it's an incredible story and thanks for sharing it.
Appreciate it.
Speaker 5 (10:22):
Robin, Keith and Corey Oates in the morning.
Rob and Kip and Corey Oates in the morning.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
We want your amazing stories. You can go to the
website kiss97. com. au and tell us all about it, which is
exactly what Rob and his daughter Molly did.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Hey, guys.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Hello. Hello.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hello.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
Hello. Hello, Dad. I've got my three musketeers, have I? Hey, Roy.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Yeah, me too, Rob.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
And Robin and Oatsy.
Speaker 4 (00:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Yes.
Speaker 5 (00:24):
I told you not to get starstruck, Dad.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Now, Molly, we got like about a 20-second version of
this story a while ago, but we were like, no,
this needs a proper platform.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
So tell us your amazing story. And it involves your dad, Rob,
who's on the phone now.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
From my understanding, you were just a child when this happened.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
Yeah, I was.
Speaker 4 (00:46):
So I was pretty much just about to turn five.
It happened on the 23rd of December, 2003. So I
was two months away from being five years old. And
every year we would do a barbecue with my godparents
and Dad decided he'd go and get new gas bottles
(01:06):
since we were going to have a barbecue. He ends
up going, my sister and I, who she would have
been about 12 at the time, she and I were
just constantly on his back, like, going, we want to
come too, we want to come too. Like, we always
went going in the car with Dad.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Sure.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
Luckily, mum distracted us and said, no, dad, run, you
can go. So he goes off with the gas bottles,
swaps them over, and as he's going into Bell Street
to sort of go back home and bring the new
gas bottles home, one of the gas bottles leaked. and
ended up exploding in the back of the car.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
What?
Speaker 4 (01:43):
In the back of his station wagon. He just heard
a hissing noise and sort of looked around and saw
that one of them was leaking and said, yep, time
to put the window down. And that's ultimately what ended
up saving his life because he was able to get
out of the car. Yeah, ended up just outside Ipswich
train station and the car was just completely engulfed. And,
(02:05):
you know, Dad was all... covered in burns and um
i think to my recollection it was 70 percent.
Speaker 5 (02:14):
Okay about this time i feel like we should bring
robin yes first of all i'd like to say isn't
it great.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
You didn't go molly yeah yeah yeah that's.
Speaker 4 (02:23):
Something we're really really happy with especially my mom she
was like well you know i would have would have
lost them all and Luckily, everyone survived because, you know,
we were able to, you know, mum was able to
control us and dad was able to, you know, focus
on saving himself rather than because there's no way he
would have left the car if we were in there.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
Yes. Wow.
Speaker 4 (02:45):
We would have all been gone.
Speaker 5 (02:46):
Okay, Rob, let's take us to the moment where you're
hearing the hissing and you realise something is wrong. What
happened after that?
Speaker 3 (02:55):
It was down in Ipswich. I'm coming along the river
road and I hear this hissing and I go, hang on,
that's not right. So I've done a shoulder turn to
the left. I've seen some vapour coming out of this
bottle and I thought, oh. So I thought, I'll wind
the window down because I thought, well, there's plenty of
parking at the railway. I'll stop there. Going around the
(03:17):
second roundabout, it just exploded.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
Whoa. Do you know what the spark was?
Speaker 3 (03:22):
They tell me that it all happens under the seat
with these newfangled window winders and new cars. All the
stuff you've got is under your seat. And because LPG
is a heavy gas, it doesn't go up, it goes down.
So it's gone down and something's happened with the electrics
and it's gone up.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
So you putting.
Speaker 5 (03:41):
The window down sparked the explosion?
Speaker 3 (03:44):
Well, apparently, yes.
Speaker 5 (03:46):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
But, whoa.
Speaker 5 (03:48):
Otherwise, you could gas yourself to death.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Now, there's an alternative.
Speaker 3 (03:50):
There's your option. Bear in mind, it's a 42-degree day,
two days before Christmas, and so you think, okay, I've
got the air conditioner going, and I thought, well, I'm
going to need a window open here because I'm going
to have to get out or I'm going to have
to let the gas out.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
If you can hear the gas, that's a big leak
if you can hear it coming out.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Yeah. Have they said how it started just leaking randomly?
Speaker 3 (04:14):
I believe that it's all about the gas expanding in
the tank. It was sitting on a hot platform against
a hot wall when I picked it up.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
Yeah, and now it's in the air conditioning of your
car and.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
You're moving around. That's exactly right. And I don't know
what that does inside a gas bottle, but it didn't
do much good that day.
Speaker 5 (04:35):
You two are hilarious.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
You're getting crazy.
Speaker 5 (04:38):
You're caught into the logistics rather.
Speaker 3 (04:40):
Than the fact that.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
I'm stunned by... What about those little plastic caps that
are always in them? Aren't they there to stop the leaking?
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Yeah, the little yellow screw cap now was developed after
my accident. Whoa!
Speaker 4 (04:50):
Yeah, that's what happened because of Dad.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
That's incredible.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
That safeguard now that we all have every time you
pick up a swap and go, that's because you nearly
blew up.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (05:01):
And when I.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
When I.
Yes, it got me there.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
Oh.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
Oh, God. Sorry, mate. Sorry, mate.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Do you know what?
Speaker 5 (05:14):
Let's give you a couple of moments to regroup, Rob,
and then let's come back.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
Yeah, it's okay. I was just going to say the
policeman that came and saw me in hospital only goes
to fatals, apparently.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
They said about five seconds. They said another five seconds
in the car. And he'd be gone. Wow.
Speaker 5 (05:36):
But you got out, and you got out, and you
were on fire.
Speaker 3 (05:39):
I was actually pulled out of a car.
Speaker 5 (05:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
If you can imagine, and this is where I get
really interested, because the car exploded, the window was down,
and I put my arms out.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
Do you want me to go, Dad? Go on, Molly. So, essentially,
he put his arms out, and... Usually when you think
of someone trying to get out a window, you see
them sort of shoulder first or sort of climbing their
way out. But it was almost like he was being pulled.
He was being pulled out of the car, even though
(06:15):
there wasn't anyone there. He remembers being pulled out of
the car. Like you don't get out of a car
that way.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
I hadn't undone the seatbelt. I hadn't put the car
in park. I hadn't done anything. I put my arms
out the window. And you know the rest.
Speaker 4 (06:31):
And out he went.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Wow.
Speaker 5 (06:33):
Okay, what do you think that was, Rob?
Speaker 3 (06:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (06:36):
Something greater than you?
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Is that what you're saying? Yeah.
Speaker 5 (06:38):
Oh, yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Like a spirit or something?
Speaker 3 (06:41):
Yeah, a God moment. Someone was looking after me.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
Wow. A God moment.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
It was all caught on camera. They say that in
one of the camera angles you can actually see someone.
See someone?
Speaker 5 (06:54):
You are meant to be here. So what is it
over the last 23 years? that has happened that you
feel that's part of why you're still here. And I
know for a fact you changed laws around gas bottles.
You are meant to be here.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
My friend.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (07:13):
100%.
Speaker 5 (07:14):
Absolutely. So that, I mean, I've got goosebumps all over
my body because it's these stories that make other people
think and believe about greater things than themselves. And that
is wonderful. But let's go back to you're now, What, 70%
burns to your body?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
If you can imagine, the bottle was in the back
of the car. The explosion shot through from the console
to the windscreen and back into my face from the windscreen.
Speaker 1 (07:40):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
So it hit my arm on the way through and
then hit my face and the rest of my body
on the way back.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
Where are you burnt?
Speaker 5 (07:47):
All up and down your arms, your.
Speaker 3 (07:49):
Legs, your face? The left arm had a skin graft. Mm-hmm.
And my face was, my hair was burnt off. And
my wife was concerned about my ears being burnt off.
And she said, how's he going to hold his sunglasses on?
I wasn't burnt on the chest, but I was burnt
(08:11):
around the back of the neck and on the face.
And they're still there today. And they're with me all
the time now. And you look at it and you
can't forget it. But it's just part of who I
am now, you know.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Hey, Rob, so this story is from December 23, 2003.
So 23 years ago. And yet you nearly broke down
or you did break down a couple of minutes ago.
Speaker 3 (08:34):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
What is it that gets you when you retell this story?
Speaker 3 (08:37):
I'm an emotional person most of the time. Molly will
tell you, I can't watch a movie, I can't watch
a soppy movie without having a tear.
Speaker 5 (08:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
For three weeks there in hospital, I had a face
the size of a basketball and my eyes were closed
and all puffed up and everything. It was fairly intense.
And there were times when you get a bit of
anxiety out of it.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
So is it the fear of the moment or is
it the way you feel now, whether it's blessed or
lucky to be alive?
Speaker 3 (09:07):
I'm glad to be here. I'm lucky to be here. But,
I mean, I had a lot of help. There was
a lot of help. I couldn't have done all this
on my own. And those three weeks were just horrendous.
Speaker 4 (09:22):
I just remember, like, my mum would have to do
the dressings every morning and every afternoon and just fresh
new dressings. And I thought, God, the burns weren't even
half of it. It was the recovery. And it's so
great to have a dad who is so... emotional. We
don't have men who show their emotion enough. And I
(09:43):
think getting his story out there, it shows that you
can get through it. If my dad can get through
what he got through, anyone can.
Speaker 5 (09:53):
Well, I feel like this is a $ 500 story.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Right there. It is. Yeah, I believe so.
Speaker 5 (09:58):
And I feel like this should be something that you
guys can go and celebrate as a family, maybe go
and have a great meal or do something together, whatever
you want to do, Rob.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
I think that's a great idea. As long as we
don't have a barbecue.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
I was going to say, stay away from teppanyaki grills, Rob.
Speaker 4 (10:13):
We'll let someone else have.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
A barbecue, hey?
Speaker 3 (10:16):
Thank you for letting me tell the story.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
Mate, it's an incredible story and thanks for sharing it.
Appreciate it.
Speaker 5 (10:22):
Robin, Keith and Corey Oates in the morning.
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The Bobby Bones Show
Listen to 'The Bobby Bones Show' by downloading the daily full replay.