Hana Wegner sues over ice cream puddle on Woolworths floor

A PUDDLE of ice cream on the floor of a Woolworths supermarket was all it took to bring jetsetting fashionista Hana Wegner's life to a crashing halt.

The woman who taught Aussie fashion star Michelle Jank her craft slipped and broke her back in two places. She was in hospital for months.

Almost three years later she is still in constant pain, cannot walk up stairs, sit at a desk or travel - certainly not to Europe, where her work required her to go every year.

Once a lecturer at Sydney's most prestigious fashion schools, she is virtually unemployable and, since the accident in December 2005, she has had to turn down offers to work with some of Australia's best-known clothing brands.

Now she has taken her $500,000 negligence claim to the District Court, saying the supermarket chain failed to keep a clean floor at its Town Hall store and failed to keep customers safe.