More than $40,000 has been raised in just two days to help a local server nearly killed in a U.S. motorcycle crash, thanks in part to an outpouring of support from the biker community.
Tori Drew, 26, was riding on the back of her boyfriend Rich Dodds' motorcycle on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles Saturday when a vehicle driven by a senior turned left in front of them.
The accident threw the duo from the bike and Dodds was pronounced dead the scene. Drew suffered catastrophic injuries: she broke both legs, her pelvis and ankle and several ribs. It also left the avid biker with internal bleeding and brain bruising.
She and her boyfriend, who lives in L.A., were headed away on a mini road trip with another couple at the time of the crash.
Drew, a longtime motorcycle enthusiast, is currently in the ICU in Los Angeles, and has undergone surgery on her legs and ankle, as well as a procedure to stop her liver from bleeding. She is still using a breathing tube, and will undergo another surgery next week on her shattered pelvic bones on the left side of her body.
Makenzie Chilton, Drew's boss at Colony Bar on Main Street in Vancouver, and good friend, has launched an online fundraiser to help support the young woman and her mother, who has flown to the U.S. to be with her daughter in hospital.
Drew thankfully does have insurance to cover her major medical bills, but the fundraiser will be used to pay her other medical costs, flight back home as well as what will certainly be a long recovery period.
The young server is well-liked among their patrons, and she and her co-workers and friends wanted to do something to help, Chilton said.
More than 680 people had donated a total of $41,303 by Wednesday afternoon. Chilton partially attributes the impressive sum to the motorcycle community, who have come together to help a fellow rider.
"We've gotten donations from people who have never met her, but they ride and they just to do something to help," she said, adding that her friends are looking at doing some renovations to make her home more accessible once she returns home.
Drew remains heavily sedated in intensive care, but Chilton said her friend has shown some positive signs: opening her eyes, nodding, and some soundless laughs.
"She's so well loved," she said.
A fundraiser for Drew will be held at Colony Bar on Main Street on Wednesday, August 17.
