Farmingdale High School student Audrina Crocitto thanks doctors, first responders who came to rescue in wake of deadly bus crash
NEW HYDE PARK, N.Y. -- A Long Island student spoke out Wednesday about last month's deadly Farmingdale High School bus crash in Orange County.
The wreck on Sept. 21 killed the school's band director and a retired teacher who was chaperoning a trip to Pennsylvania.
Tears streamed down the face of 15-year-old Audrina Crocitto after she was reunited with the medical team that saved her life.
"I want to thank him. He is the reason I am here today and walking," Crocitto said of Dr. Shaun Rodgers of Cohen Children's Medical Center.
"If the bone is fractured very much and it dislocates you can become paralyzed from the waist down. She was very lucky," Rodgers said.
Doctors stabilized Crocitto's spine with screws and rods, and treated blood clots and a neck fracture. She suffered the injury when a charter bus carrying her high school's marching band rolled down an embankment on I-84.
"It kind of swerved and then swerved again, and after that I think I blacked out," Crocitto said.
"It has been a long, long four weeks. When I got the phone call, she was so far away. I received a picture from someone of the bus in the ravine and when I saw the bus in the ravine, that I was completely devastated," said Kristi Crocitto, Audrina's mother.
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The Farmingdale school family soon learned that band director Gina Pellettiere and retired teacher Beatrice Ferrari were killed, and dozens of children were injured.
"As it was rolling, I was launched to one side and then the other and launched out the window," Audrina Crocitto said.
When the junior brigade member of Farmingdale's fire department and aspiring EMT finally regained consciousness, she knew not to move.
"There were kids panicking. I told them to calm down and stay still," Audrina said.
When the flight medics arrived and realized the gravity of the situation, they had her airlifted from Orange County to Cohen Children's Medical Center.
"At first, I refused to get on that helicopter. I didn't want to go. I had never flown, first time. I knew I had to get through it," Audrina said.
She said she visualized Pellettiere at the pearly gates.
"Ms. Pellettiere was at those gates and said, 'No, not letting in any of my students.' I wanted to give up, to be honest, but I got through it," Audrina said.
One month after the crash, doctors continue to treat six of her classmates who were less seriously injured. They are back in school. Audrina said she plans to join them as soon as she's healed.
"I know no one's going to get over this, but as long as we stay together, I think we got this," she said.
Crocitto said she dreams of taking to the field next year and marching with her band, playing her clarinet.
