SEATTLE – Family and friends are mourning a 16-year-old Snohomish girl as they watch at the bedside of her 14-year-old sister in a Seattle hospital room.
Hannah Zylstra died Saturday night after losing control of her car on Woods Creek Road at Yeager Road near Monroe, colliding with a sport utility vehicle.
Her sister, Emily, was airlifted to Harborview Medical Center, where she is recovering from head injuries and a broken leg.
The younger girl underwent three surgeries on Christmas Eve to her head, face and leg. Doctors removed bone fragments from the optic nerve canal behind her right eye, but were unsure if she would regain full sight.
On Tuesday, they fitted the girl’s battered right leg with a hot-pink cast.
Her petite face was swollen and her front teeth knocked out, but Emily still managed smiles for her visitors.
Parents Fred and Christine Zylstra said they and their other nine children were leaning on an outpouring of support from family, church friends, neighbors and the community.
They are remembering Hannah, even as they marvel at the recovery of her younger sister.
“We know beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Lord and Jesus Christ planned Hannah before she was born and gifted her with all of her talents and character traits, and that he also numbered her days on this Earth,” Christine Zylstra said.
“We as a family are blessed that we had her for this amount of time,” she said.
“And we’ll get to see her again,” said Colette Sweet, the girls’ older sister.
A memorial service is scheduled for Saturday with plans for a potluck dinner to follow.
Hannah was known for her enthusiasm and radiant smile. She had many friends, and her family said her faith was important to her.
Never one to pass an opportunity, Hannah threw herself into numerous activities at school and in the dairy industry, including 4-H and Future Farmers of America.
“Hannah had so much life in her, she was never happy with what she could do. She always wanted to do more,” Fred Zylstra said. “As a parent, I couldn’t have been prouder. She was like a ray of sunshine coming through the window on a gray day.”
The sisters were on their way home from a friend’s house to make their 11 p.m. curfew when the crash happened.
They were westbound on Woods Creek Road in a 1999 Chevrolet Cavalier shortly before 10:45 p.m. when their car crossed the centerline and collided with an eastbound 1993 Ford Explorer.
“They lost control, overcorrected and went into a counter-spin,” Snohomish County sheriff’s spokesman Rich Niebusch said.
The driver of the Explorer was not seriously injured; a passenger was not injured, police and fire officials said.
Police are investigating whether speed was a factor in the crash, Niebusch said.
Friends of the girls notified a brother, Fritz Zylstra, of the crash, who then called their parents early Sunday morning. A sheriff’s deputy and chaplain showed up a short time later.
Before heading to the hospital, the couple met with their pastor and with Tim and Sandi Frohning, close friends who recently lost their son, Danny, in a hunting accident.
Church friends at New Hope Fellowship in Monroe have set up a fund in Hannah’s name to help the family with medical bills.
The family said Emily could be released by the end of this week.
Back at home, Christmas stockings still hang in the living room.
A cooler sits in Emily’s hospital room to hold food, so the family never has to go far. Fred Zylstra looks forward to his first shower in more than three days. Visitors stream in and out.
The company and support of friends helps them keep going.
“It’s a beautiful thing to see it. It really makes you realize how blessed you are, even in a time of tragedy,” Fred Zylstra said.
It’s when the couple pauses that the tears come.
On Christmas day, the pair ate together in the hospital cafeteria. “She said, ‘I just want to hear her voice,’” Fred Zylstra recalled.
The couple called Hannah’s cell phone to listen to her voice mail greeting.
Reporter Melissa Slager: 425-339-3465 or mslager@heraldnet.com.
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