Junior Bok team doctor's mid-flight lifesaving intervention

The South African Under-20 team has become used to ‘delays’ in recent weeks, but the most recent pause in their plans involved a lifesaving intervention by the team doctor.

The World Rugby U20 Championship Final between the Junior Springboks and France this past Saturday was delayed by 45 minutes.

The kick-off at the Mikheil Meskhi Stadium in Tbilisi, Georgia, on July 18, was pushed back due to a threatening lightning storm in the area.

Despite the disruption, the Junior Boks went on to win the match 16-5 (half-time 6-0), securing historic back-to-back world titles.

Kevin Foote’s charges became the first South African U20 side in history to win back-to-back Junior World Championship titles – following in the footsteps of a record-breaking Springbok side that won back-to-back Rugby World Cups in 2019 and 2023.

South Africa have now won 11 consecutive matches on the Junior World Championship stage and become the fourth team to go back-to-back after New Zealand (2008-11), England (2013-14) and France (2018-19).

With the Under-20 trophy also safely tucked away for another year, South Africa is the first rugby nation to be back-to-back champions in the senior World Cup, the junior world championship, and also the Sevens world champions!

However, there was one unexpected holdup for the victorious team during the Cape Town-bound cluster’s connecting flight from Johannesburg.

Due to a medical emergency on board the connecting flight to Cape Town, the aircraft carrying the Under-20 coach, players and management returned to OR Tambo Airport.

The emergency involved a fellow passenger, but the U20 team doctor, Clement Plaatjies, was called upon to administer a lifesaving intervention.

Dave Wessels, General Manager for High Performance Rugby, noticed a woman had collapsed in the aisle.

He alerted Plaatjies, who rushed to the woman’s rescue.

The unnamed person had no pulse, but the doctor managed to resuscitate her, and the flight returned to Johannesburg for further medical care.

They were already flying over Bloemfontein when the incident happened.

The SA U20 team and fellow passengers had to wait while all the luggage was ‘disembarked’ to remove the woman’s property.

The flight, originally scheduled to arrive in Cape Town at about 15.45, finally disembarked at about 19.15.