One of our own needs our Help!

[oossuuu754]

I am challenging everyone to help one of our own, SKYMANGS, The S10 Swap How To sticky thread author was severely injured in a fire at his shop. A detail of the events can be found here There is a GoFundMe page setup to help him and his family with expenses. Please help me by spreading the word. I ask that you incorporated the link http://gofundme.com/c49h5mjx8 into the signature, that way it automatically is posted on any thread you have replied on. Please help spread the word and link up your signature to "SKYMANGS" GoFund me link and let's help one of our own.

[63 & 64 Bowties]

Shawn, thanks for getting the word out. Let's try to keep this at the top.

[Advanced Design]

While I don't know Chris I have seen him help many folks here with questions about their projects and builds. He makes his living by building trucks for customers so he is pretty generous for helping others.

Thank you for whatever you can do to help his family during this difficult time.

[Mathew21]

I don't know Chris but I have read through some of his post in the past when I considering building an earlier truck. He has helped a lot of members on this site. It's time for to help him now. I made a donation.

Matt

[oossuuu754]

Appreciate all the donations, we are about a 1/3 of the way to the $5k goal, please keep this circulating so we can get there. With 57k forum members certainly we can raise the funds!

[aerotruk63]

That was an easy one ,

[oossuuu754]

Thank you to all who have donated! As you can see we cracked the $2000 mark and we are now almost halfway to the $5000 goal. Please keep spreading the word so we can help Chris out, donations can be made here or clinking the link in my signature. Additionally if you would please insert the Chris' link into your signature so it will show up on all the threads you reply on.

Chris has been in ICU almost a month now, here is the latest update from his wife.

By Jennifer Klapp — Aug 3, 2015 3:34pm

Chris is doing well, not much has really changed. He is off the ventilator during the day, night they put him on because of his sleep apnea. He is aware of the comings and goings in his room and will slightly respond to questions, by shrugs or shaking of head, or blinking. He is moving a little bit, I am sure his legs and arms feel as though they weigh a ton. He is still on dialysis, but is putting out urine, so they are slowly kicking back on. They are worried that he may have pneumonia again, but they watching. He is slowly getting to the point to were he will be able to have visitors, just need to get him out of ICU portion of the burn center.

[perro13]

I'm in. Get well soon

[perro13]

one of are own needs a little help. every dollar helps.

[oossuuu754]

I talked to Chris' wife today, and received more info or more of their beat guess until Chris can tell us. He was finishing up the 54 for Bob R (pics on his page). Working on the filler neck or the fuel door and there was a flash fire that totally consumed the inside of the shop. I will post pics later but it is bad. Chris was trapped inside the shop for a while, but at some point got out and was able to call 911 before he passed out outside.

His burns are all above the waist, mostly on his arms and around his left ear. But the good news is that several of the burns are starting to heal on their own. If he can just fight the infection they are hopeful.

By Jennifer Klapp — 9 hours ago


This week started on a good note, with Chris really responding to questions and moving his head and limbs. But things took a turn for the worst on Tuesday morning. Chris spiked a 106 temperature and it took all day to get it down to 101. So Michael and I stayed the night with Chris that night and it stayed down all night, so home we went at 5:30am on Wednesday. Wednesday was a quiet day with a temperature still hanging around but not going over 102. Thursday was a quiet day with nothing real big happening, which is okay because Tuesday was quit exciting. Through the week Chris's urine output has gotten better. So this morning when I was visiting the kidney doctor was around and told me that if he continues on this up slope that they will stop dialysis and take out the stint for the dialysis. Tomorrow he is going to have a feeding tube put into his gut to make it easier on him. Right now the feeding tube is going through the nose, so I am sure it is a bit bothersome.

Chris is slowly climbing the hill of recovery and the prayers and good vibes are greatly appreciated.

[Johnny_Lamebridge]

Done. Every little bit counts...

[oossuuu754]

So for those of you who have asked for some photos of Chris' shop here they are. As you can see it is basically a complete loss. Two trucks destroyed, Chris son's TF truck and a customer Bob R. Currently we are sitting at about $2500 in donations, so please lets get the word and help if we can! Donate Here!

[cg285]

just a note: my boy went through this a few years back. he no longer has control of his hands due to how they had his arms extended for a long period (7 months in icu) which created unrepairable nerve damage. that burn hospital no longer does that i'm told. should anyone have questions on that i can put them in touch. (afterwards he started a "phoenix society for burn survivors" in norfolk and does support and lectures)

[wayno]

Glad to be in a position to help another father and fellow hot-rodder. Get well soon Chris.

[oossuuu754]

Here is an update on Chris from his wife:


By Jennifer Klapp — Aug 15, 2015 9:10pm


Chris is doing well this week. His dialysis catheter was removed on Wednesday. He has still had a slight fever, but keeping down the upper 90's to 101. He tracks you with his eyes and tries to talk to you, but gets very frustrated when you can't figure out what he is trying to tell you. But the doctors are happy with his progress. The burns are healing well and the two places that they will have to do some reconstruction on they have vacuum packed right now. This procedure will cause the body to send extra blood to those areas to help stimulate growth on it is own. Next week he should be getting a feeding tube placed in the gut and removed from his nose.

[Palf70Step]

Glad to hear he is improving. Thanks for the update.

[oossuuu754]

Jennifer posted another update

Busy week

By Jennifer Klapp — 49 minutes ago

this week has started off busy, in the aspect of Chris being rolled off to here and there and everywhere. Yesterday he went for a CT scan and today he is going to three different places, one being MRI. Right now they are putting in a filter to stop blood clots from going to the lungs. Later he is going to go down to have a drain tube or re put in to get some fluid off the lungs. Tomorrow or Thursday he is going to surgery for skin grafts on elbow and maybe hand. We meet Dr. Grossmen on VTC yesterday , a meeting about what they are going to do tomorrow or Thursday.

[oossuuu754]

Let's see if we can get this ball rolling again. We need about $1900 to get the $5000 goal. Please share this and lets help out Chris. He is making some progress but is still facing a long recovery battle. Please donate here: http://gofundme.com/c49h5mjx8

[oossuuu754]

Updated from Chris' Wife. We still need about $2k to hit the $5k goal

By Jennifer Klapp — Aug 27, 2015 10:45am


So naturally things have changed since the beginning of the week. He is no longer having the skin flap done until they can get this infection in and around his lungs resolved. So tomorrow Chris will be having surgery to have the fluid that developed on the outside of his lungs removed. Then in a couple of weeks once infection is not a worry they will do the skin flap on his elbow.

Every day he is becoming more aware of everything around him. Yesterday I got to tell him about what has happened since he has been in the hospital. How there was a time when we didn't know if he was going to make it through the night. It was a little hard and I don't know how much he understood. Probably more than I believe he understood.

Thank you for all the support and prayers that you all have been sending our direction.