"AT 11 years old, Dwayne Fernandes had become a double leg amputee.
Now 23, he runs up buildings with more than 1500 stairs.
Indian-born Fernandes, who resides in Blacktown, was born with a birth defect that left him with weak lower limbs.
This in turn forced him to have his feet removed and replaced with titanium carbon-fibre prosthetics.
Last year, Fernandes put his legs to the ultimate test and became the first double amputee to run up the 1501-stair Sydney Tower Run-Up event.
And as far as he is concerned, it hasn’t really affected his life negatively at all.
“I’ve pretty much been able to do everything that anybody else can do, well ... except bungee jumping for obvious reasons,” he jokes.
“I’ve always been a confident person and never try to disguise my prosthetic legs, like a lot of amputees do, because I feel I am who I am and they are a part of me.”
In fact, Fernandes said there were benefits to his prosthetics that other people missed out on.
It has meant that he can choose his own height and is vertically free.
“I remember in university there was a girl who was two inches taller than me, and by the end of the year she was shocked to see I was two inches taller than her,” he said.
Fernandes has adopted a simple, yet effective philosophy that he encourages everybody to live by.
“It’s either hide in your own shadow or get out and inspire others. I’ve got a couple of friends who have a disability and hide behind it, but I see this as pretty pointless,” he said. “It doesn’t matter what you’ve got, as long as you use it, because in countries like Australia there’s so much to utilise so you can’t really waste it on excuses.”
And with that, Fernandes will take on a new world-first this February when he flies to New York in an attempt to become the first double amputee to scale the 1576 stairs of the Empire State building Tower-Run Up.
As an insolvency accountant by day for PBB, Fernandes says his goal wouldn’t have been possible had it not been for PBB sponsoring him to fly to New York for the event."
