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Two sisters are among five high schoolers killed or injured when the car they were in crashed into a tree in rural Michigan, according to police and school officials.
Jordyn Bigham, 15, and another 16-year-old student were pronounced dead at the scene of the horrific crash in Kalamazoo County just before 3:30 a.m. Sunday, according to officials and a fundraiser started by her grieving family.
Bigham’s 16-year-old sister, Jadisson “Jada” Bigham, was also hospitalized in critical condition, with two other friends — ages 15 and 17 — in critical but stable condition, WOOD-TV reported.
Jada faces a “difficult road to recovery ahead, requiring extensive medical treatments, surgeries, and ongoing care,” the fundraiser said.
“Their mother is now carrying a heavy burden that no parent should ever have to face: mourning the loss of one daughter while standing by the hospital bed of another.”
All five were students at Mattawan High School in a small city of about 2,500 people about 60 miles south of Grand Rapids.
One of the other injured students was identified by her father as Liyra Fuller in another online fundraiser.
Investigators believe the vehicle had been traveling west on West R Avenue when it left the roadway and struck a tree around 3:23 a.m. Sunday. It was not immediately clear who was driving or where the friends were heading.
A vigil was held Monday night in Mattawan High School’s parking lot, while a makeshift memorial of flowers and balloons marks the site of the crash.
Mattawan Consolidated School District Superintendent Randy Fleenor told WZZM that the community’s response has moved him.
“Just to know that we’re not alone, that we’re all in this together, and means a great deal to the students here and the staff that know these kids,” Fleenor said.
“Everybody grieves differently, and you really see that after an incident this traumatic. Some students hold it in; they don’t want to talk to anybody initially. Days later, weeks later, it may surface,” Fleenor continued.
Mattawan High School has just over 1,100 students in grades 9 through 12, according to US News and World Report.