It may not be a pretty sight, but we have passed our EMT training and we can take it. Post a picture.

In the meantime, it will do fine with damp paper towels after the roots have been watered enough to turn green.

Short version, trim any roots that are hollow and squishy. Don't do anything about the leaves just yet. And don't rush, this is not an emergency situation.

A rescue was my first orchid, too. This guy was at walmart in their greenhouse area in the middle of December. It had no blooms, multiple broken leaves, and was dry as a bone. They gave it to me for free. It has now grown a new leaf (on the right) and is in the process of rewarding me with this spike as you can see. I'm looking forward to finding out what color blooms it has.

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Good luck with yours!

Thanks so much for the advice and the encouragement! The pic of your rescued one looks very lovely and healthy - there's hope for my little one!

Here's pics of it I took when it arrived home last night:

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As you can see no part of the plant is undamaged (though I see now I should have been a little more careful of the flowers when taking this picture). I think it has one and a half functional leaves. Most of the flowers are missing a petal.

Today it seems a bit happier by the window with damp-tissued roots in a bowl. Some of the roots seem to be quite green now. I'm going to the garden centre this evening to pick up some potting mix. I'm guessing a bark mixture?

I am much encouraged by the picture. It will look a little rough while it grows new leaves, but the old ones will die in time and you will not see any damage. The roots look very healthy.

Best to cut off the flower spike. That takes energy to maintain. It will recover sooner.

Bark mix is fine. Select a pot that the roots fit into, no larger. The pot should have slits to allow air flow.

If your leaves are just cracked/creased but still attached, you can use masking tape on the backside of the leaf. This will keep them intact and still functioning to feed the roots.

Brooke

Actually, your plant looks fine, except for blemished leaves. And you even know what the flowers look like. Nice shade of rose. Sweet.

In addition to what others have said, make sure the pot (probably plastic) has several holes in the bottom. Wild Phals live in trees, with their roots exposed. The bark in your pot needs to drain fairly quickly.

If the only plastic pots available have only one hole in the bottom, you can create more.

Also, if your water is softened, you'll need to find a source for unsoftened because the salts will kill the roots. I hope softened water is a foreign concept to you, :) but we have it in the States.

In a big box store, a Phal was overlooked after Mother's Day, when they cleared out all the live orchids. It sat among artificial Phals for six weeks - no water, no nothing. They still charged me a few dollars for the plant.

I submerged leaves and roots in water for 24 hours, trimmed roots, potted it, and it recovered quickly and rebloomed a few months later.

So, see - your Phal will probably be just fine.

Whitecat8

I agree with highjack about the masking tape, but I would cut it into strips no larger than a half inch and make a butterfly. The back of the leaf is where the orchid takes in fertilizer and other micro nutrients, so you don't want to cover too much of it. I generally use 1/4" green adhesive florists' tape, and use it on the right side of the leaf. Being dark green, it's not as offensive. As you can tell from the suggestions, we've all had broken leaves and have first aid remedies in our orchid arsenal.

Thanks so much to everyone for all your helpful messages and encouraging stories! The wee one is now bandaged (sparingly - thanks for that note, I was wondering about that!), repotted in an holey, cosy, see-through plastic tub with nice orchid-bark mixture and is very clearly happy with her change of fortune.

She's (dunno why she's a she but she is) is insisting on opening up a flower. I didn't have the heart to chop it off, though I know it's taking up precious energy - is this foolish? I've trimmed off all the others though down at a node, and sterilized it with cinammon powder. Here's what she looks like now:

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I think the water here is hard if the scale in the kettle is anything to go by. I will investigate what "soft water" is in german and see what I can do. Hmm, found it already - weichwasser. Okay, now just the interesting problem of where to buy it. Hmm...

Anyway, assuming I fix that issue, any final thoughts on when to start fertilizing her? I have orchid fertilizer in standby for when I get back home on Sunday.

Thanks again everyone!

Good luck with your orchid. As far as water quality goes perhaps a good place to start would be to read past threads on water quality. Some "soft water" is an orchid disaster.

You can get an analysis of the tap water from your water provider. Tap water in most places is fine for orchids.