Story of Heroism Emerges From Colorado

 

By Sean Frye

Editors Note: “Allie Young is a friend of mine who went to K-State with me. After Obama made his statement, I contacted her online and talked to her about her story.”

On Sunday, July 22, President Barack Obama visited the families of those both slain and wounded in the recent Aurora, Colo. shootings at the University of Colorado Hospital. He consoled the families that had loved ones killed in the movie theater, and also listened to the stories of the 58 survivors.

One of those survivors is Allie Young, a 19-year-old woman who is a former K-State student, and will be returning to the university this fall semester. After the president visited with the victims, he addressed the media in the hospital. During his , he went into detail the story of how Young, with the heroic efforts of her best friend, Stephanie Davies, was able to survive the horrific encounter.

Young’s story begins late Thursday night, when her and Davies decided to attend the midnight screening of the new Batman movie, “The Dark Knight Rises.”

“We actually wanted to go to the movie because we were planning on going back to Manhattan the next morning and didn’t want to be up all night drinking,” Young said. “So thought a movie would be nice and calm.”

Little did Young know that the movie she predicted would be calm would soon be making national headlines for the wrong reasons.

According to reports, at approximately 12:38a.m., as Young was enjoying popcorn and a pickle, suspected gunman James Holmes entered the theater through an exit door which had propped open, and threw a gas canister into the room.

“He threw them only a few feet from Allie and Stephanie, who were sitting there watching the film,” Obama said in a statement after speaking with the two, along with Young’s parents. “Allie stood up, seeing that she might need to do something or at least warn the other people that were there, and she was immediately shot.”

As Allie fell to the ground in the aisle, Davies went down to help save her friend. She applied pressure to her gunshot wounds on her carotid artery, and with her other free hand called 9-1-1.

However, Young wanted her friend to save herself, for Young thought that it was already too late.

“I told her to leave though because I couldn’t move and the shooter was walking around the empty theater shooting and killing people who were still alive and I didn’t want her to be found,” Young said. “I already thought I was dead so I couldn’t risk her life for mine. She refused to leave and I am so thankful she didn’t because I know I would be dead if she had left me.”

When authorities arrived on the scene and began to clear the movie theater, Davies helped carry Young to an ambulance. Once Young arrived at the hospital, it was discovered that she had 32 fragments throughout her body. She was rushed into emergency surgery.

“They removed the fragments of shotgun from my carotid artery in my neck and cauterized it so it would stop bleeding,” Young said. “I also had a drainage tube put in my ribs because my lungs were filling up with blood but they didn’t have tine to put me out for that so I was just numbed and had it put in right in the hospital hallway.”

Throughout the entire ordeal, Davies was left unharmed.

Young still has roughly 30 shotgun fragments left in her body, which doctors say would be too risky at this point to surgically remove.

“It is just as risky to try and take them out as it is to leave the there,” Young said. “But there are four pieces that are really close to my heart so I have to keep getting x-rays and [echocardiograms] to make sure they are not getting closer. If they do I have to have immediate surgery.”

While Young is still not fully out of the woods, her prognosis is extremely bright thanks to Davies.

“Because of Stephanie’s timely actions, and I just had a conversation with Allie downstairs, she is going to be fine,” Obama said.

At the time of print, Young was hopeful that the tube inserted into her lungs would be removed at any time.

“I have to let all of the blood from my tube in my ribs drain and that is really painful,” Young said. “That is honestly the source of almost all of my pain.”

Despite being shot in what Obama called a “heinous crime,” Young still plans to return to K-State this fall after spending the Spring and Summer semesters at the University of Colorado-Denver.

“This has made some things like traveling more difficult, but I’m still eager to get back to Manhattan in the Fall,” Young said.

The story of Davies’ heroism and the perseverance by Young not only served as a focal point of the President of the United States’ statement to the country following his visit with the victims’ families, but also gave Young a second chance at life itself.

“I don’t know how many people at any age would have the presence of mind that Stephanie did or the courage that Allie showed,” Obama said. “And so as tragic as the circumstances of what we’ve seen today are, as heartbreaking as it is for the families, it’s worth us spending most of our time reflecting on young Americans like Allie and Stephanie because they represent what’s best in us and they assure us that out of this darkness, a brighter day is going to come.”