Bosnia: Crash Victim Airlifted Home 6/19/07

By Mike Jacobs

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  • Andy Meier

WAUWATOSA - Andy Meier, who suffered serious head injuries in a bus crash in Bosnia, is back in Wisconsin. He was airlifted out of Sarajevo, arriving at Froedtert Hospital Monday evening.

Meier flew by air ambulance from Sarajevo to Milwaukee with several stops along the way. The trip took nearly 30 hours. He's still in bad shape with serious head and neck injuries. He still has no feeling in his legs. But he was never expected to return home this soon.

Elizabeth Meier"It's such a relief to be here," wife Elizabeth Meier said outside Froedtert. She could barely contain her joy. Her husband, 53, was the most critically injured of the 27 hurt on the tour bus one week ago.

The bus, with 35 people mostly from Wisconsin, was headed to a holy shrine in Medjugorje when it crashed into a jack-knifed semi. The tour bus plunged down a 40-foot ravine into a river.

Elizabeth Meier and the couple's three children were also hurt, but not as badly.

Elizabeth Meier said her husband is very happy to be back home. "He's so happy to be in an American hospital where people are speaking English and modern technology is available.

"He's talking and he's laughing and he's crying and he's mostly crying about the kids, that they're safe, because he didn't know. The accident was so bad he didn't know if everyone was as badly injured as he was," she said.

Early on, there was no guarantee Andy Meier would live.

Elizabeth Meier attributes his survival to prayer. "I really am grateful for people praying for him and for everybody on that bus because without prayer I don't think he'd be here right now and I don't think he'd be home today."