The westbound pickup lost traction on an icy bridge near Ramsay. The truck slid and then rolled. The driver and a passenger in the shotgun seat escaped with minor injuries.
But Carly Moodry, unbelted in the middle, was ejected through the pickup's rear window. The date of the early morning crash on Interstate 90 west of Butte was April 19, 2007. The Anaconda native was 19 years old at the time, a student at Montana Tech and a part-time employee at Fred's Mesquite Grill in Butte, where she had worked that night.
Rhonda Moodry, Carly's mother, accompanied her gravely injured daughter on the Life Flight to St. Patrick Hospital in Missoula. Rhonda learned Carly had suffered a traumatic brain injury.
The prognosis was grim. The first physician predicted that if Carly survived, she'd live out her life in a long-term care facility. He said surgery to relieve pressure on Carly's brain was an option, but so was simply accepting the reality of her profound injury and allowing her to die.
Rhonda recalled that conversation. "He said, 'Should we just get her comfortable and let her pass?'" Mike Moodry, Carly's father, and Carly's brother, Steve, drove to Missoula. Mike learned the sobering facts from another physician who recommended surgery to remove a portion of Carly's skull to relieve pressure from her swelling brain.
"He said, 'Hey, here's the deal, she's young, she's healthy. She's got everything going for her, and I tell you, if that's my daughter lying there, I'd say operate,'" Mi.