Florida motorcyclist injured in collision with moose on Alaska road
by Sam Bishop /
sbishop@newsminer.com4 days ago | 6219 views | 18 | 34 | |
Editor's note: This story was updated from an earlier version.
FAIRBANKS — Mary Gehm works as a trauma nurse, but the scariest thing she has ever seen occurred in front of her car Saturday afternoon on the Elliott Highway. A moose charged onto the road, knocked her boyfriend off his motorcycle and then began prancing on top of him.
The wreck, and perhaps the moose’s hooves, left Paul Heydemann with multiple injuries to his head, neck and body. On Monday evening, he was recuperating at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.
Gehm, in a telephone interview, said they don’t know when they’ll make it home to Miami, Fla. “It really doesn’t matter when we make it home. It matters to me that he comes with me,” she said.
Heydemann and Gehm were on the last day of an 18-day tour of the state when the moose revised their plans. They were driving south at about 3 p.m. at 46 Mile Elliott Highway. It began to rain. Heydemann stopped to put on gear, then proceeded on the paved surface at about 30 mph on his Kawasaki Concourse, a sport touring bike. Gehm followed in a Ford Escape SUV they had rented as a backup vehicle specifically for their trip on the Elliott and Dalton highways to Wiseman and back.
They both saw the moose come up the road bank from the right. It looked at them and stopped. Heydemann pulled to the left. The moose started back to the right. Everything looked fine to Gehm, following in the Escape.
Suddenly, the moose wheeled and charged straight into Heydemann. He flew off the bike. The moose fell down but soon jumped back up. “After it barreled into him, it couldn’t figure out what it was doing, and it was prancing with its front feet,” Gehm said.
The moose soon ran off, though, and Gehm rushed up to help.
Heydemann, known as “Paulie” to his motorcycling friends, is a 58-year-old worker for Miami-Dade County. Gehm said he hasn’t touched alcohol for 15 years. She described him as extremely safety-conscious, so he was wearing a helmet and cycling armor. Still, the situation didn’t look good, she said.
“I thought he was gone,” she said.
Heydemann was unconscious. His helmet had struck an uneven spot the pavement and collapsed into his throat, cutting off his airway. Gehm pulled off the helmet, a decision that she said she knew risked spinal damage but could not be avoided.
Within a short time, a northbound driver, Lee Beasley, arrived at the accident, Gehm said.
“I had already secured the airway, and Paul was at that point breathing and he had circulation,” she said. But he was still unconscious. So she asked Beasley to go for help. He drove to the Alyeska Pipeline Service Co.’s Pump Station No. 7, located a few miles to the south.
A few more motorists, whose names Gehm did not have, stopped to help. They held coats over the group to keep the rain off, Gehm recalled appreciatively.
Beasley returned from the pump station with Chris Gilliard, a medic, and Dave Forsman. They brought Alyeska’s emergency medical vehicle. The group put Heydemann on a backboard in the vehicle, but Gilliard and Forsman were not authorized to transport him, Gehm said. So they waited for an ambulance from Fairbanks to arrive. Alaska State Troopers said the Steese Area Volunteer Fire Department responded.
The ambulance brought Heydemann and Gehm to Fairbanks Memorial Hospital, but not for long. They took a medical evacuation flight to Seattle within an hour or two. “I was losing track of time at that point,” Gehm said.
Monday evening, Heydemann was in a head and neck brace at Harborview. “I always knew he had a halo, because he’s my angel,” Gehm said. “And now he’s wearing a halo brace, so the rest of the world can know he’s an angel.”
Heydemann was alert and talking, but he didn’t remember the accident.
“I think, at this point, that’s a blessing,” Gehm said. “It’s the most scary thing you could possibly envision. For me, personally, watching the person I love being attacked, for me it was the most scary thing I’ve ever seen.”
Gehm said she is overwhelmed with gratitude for all the assistance given them by the other motorists, the Alyeska employees, the ambulance and hospital employees, several other members of the Concourse Owners Group who happened to be in the area and the people at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, where the other COG members were staying in dorms. (Gehm and Heydemann also noted that they were traveling independently and were not part of the Harley-Davidson owners’ Hoka Hey Motorcycle Challenge.)
Heydemann’s motorcycle wasn’t salvageable, Gehm said. After the moose ran into Heydemann, the cycle continued to roll upright down the road. It drifted off into a ravine, taking out trees and brush and losing parts along the way.
“I did salvage his odometer,” Gehm said. The bike had 195,000 miles on it. It was Heydemann’s first serious accident in all those miles, she said.
