Paul Laurent accident update

[kevin814]

As most of you know, Paul Laurent, a fellow Sonex pilot was involved in a bad crash recently. His nephew Shad has started a Go Fund Me page with information which can be found below. I would like to thank all of you for your thoughts, prayers, and support. Please pass this along, to increase support for Paul.

https://www.gofundme.com/PaulL

Tonight I received this email from Shad, posted here with his consent.

Message>>

I must say the response and generosity of the Sonex, and pilot community has been absolutely astonishing. I really want to thank you for sharing Paul's situation in your forum.

I am not a pilot myself, but I am extremely impressed with strength of the fraternity and amount of caring shown by the pilot and Sonex community. You mention that you engage in a risky activity like flying because of a hunger to experience the fullness of life, and the joy of escaping the bonds of gravity. This personify's Paul's life to a T. Paul always wanted to experience everything life has to offer, and loved the freedom from gravity of skydiving, and more recently, flying.

I plan to post an official update to the page within a couple days. To be honest I have been holding off a bit hoping for more positive news to report.

In the past few days doctors have attempted a couple different methods of getting a response from Paul. They first cut all of his pain and sedation medications, and he didn't respond to this in any way. A day later they attempted to remove his respirator to see if he would try breathing on his own. They report he did do some shallow irregular attempts at breathing and opened one eye slightly. He also has come down with Pneumonia, which isn't good with his condition. CT scans have shown quite a few damaged areas of the brain, but little conclusion can be drawn from its ability to recover and heal, or even to know what those areas that are damaged affect. This week doctors is to work on some facial reconstruction.

My mother, Paul's sister is moving her family (husband and twin 10 year old girls) to Savannah for the time being to care for him and be there to make medical decisions. At this point they have been offered the use of an RV through family and friends, and plan to live out of it in a local campground. Other family has and will continue to visit as able to do so back and forth from Wisconsin.

The focus of this fund will be narrowed to paying for the medical flight to bring Paul home to Wisconsin when eventually able to do so.

Thank you again for the support given by you and the Jabiru, Sonex, pilot community. Feel free to pass along the content of either of the e-mails I have sent, and I will keep in contact with any future updates.

Shad Fairchild

Message ends>>

[kevin814]

I have some good news to report, Paul is doing better, but still has a very long road ahead. Shad has posted an update on the link provided below. I received an email from Paul's sister today, and the whole family is tremendously moved by your support. I think it means more to them than they can express, and brings a little sunshine to their lives.

https://www.gofundme.com/PaulL

[fastj22]

I just gave another donation. This guy needs us. He's all alone, needs to get back to his family. Our donations will help. Lets show him we take care of our own!

[kevin814]

Amen brother. For the cost of a tank of gas we can make a tremendous difference in their lives. The good Karma is just icing on the cake.

[caveman370]

Just helped also!


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[Bryan Cotton]

I donated as well.