A Laurel High School senior is slowly waking up in a Seattle hospital nearly two weeks after a truck struck her electric scooter on her way to class, leaving her with brain bleeding in three places, a broken collarbone, bruised lungs and numerous lacerations. Raye Anderson, 17, was hit on the second day of the new school year at the intersection of Yard Office Road and East Maryland Lane in Laurel, Montana, according to her father, Torrey Anderson.
Torrey Anderson arrived at the crash scene moments after the collision, according to KTVQ, which first reported on his daughter's injuries and ongoing recovery. A police officer performed chest compressions on Raye at the scene before she was flown to a hospital in Seattle, the station reported. The station identified the crash site as the intersection of Yard Office Road and East Maryland Lane in Laurel.
A Slow, Emotional Awakening
In the days since the crash, Raye has begun waking up and slowly regaining some consciousness, per the station's report. She gave her father a thumbs-up, and in one moment that Torrey Anderson described to KTVQ, she communicated a message to him using sign language: “I love you.”
Raye is described in the same account as a Laurel High School senior who was looking forward to her final year of classes, and someone well known in the Laurel community. The Laurel Police Department, led by Police Chief Jarred Anglin, is identified on the city's police page.
A Body Already Tested by Illness
Raye's recovery is complicated by a pre-existing condition. She was born with cystic hygroma, described in the KTVQ report as a genetic defect causing a fluid-filled sac, or benign lymphatic malformation, that commonly develops in the neck or head. Before the crash, she had already undergone 27 surgeries related to the condition, according to the station's reporting.
Medical literature from the National Institutes of Health classifies cystic hygroma as a macrocystic lymphatic malformation involving fluid-filled lymphatic sacs that often requires specialized surgical removal or sclerotherapy. The condition is another part of Raye's medical history as she recovers from her injuries.
What Adolescent Brain Injuries Mean for Recovery
Brain bleeding in three places puts Raye's recovery on a longer, more uncertain timeline than many adult trauma cases. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notes that younger people can face more severe and prolonged recovery after traumatic brain injury. The CDC report cited here does not provide a 2025 estimate for the share of U.S. children and adolescents who experience traumatic brain injury in a 12-month period.
A GoFundMe account has been set up to help Raye Anderson recover in the hospital, according to KTVQ's original report on her injuries.
Open Questions Around the Crash
It remains unclear whether Raye was wearing a helmet or had lighting equipment on her scooter at the time of the early-morning collision. Montana's electric-scooter rules require riders under 18 to wear a helmet and cap e-scooter speeds on public roadways at 20 miles per hour, according to ARideJunkie. The source does not specify lighting requirements for scooters.
Whether any citations or charges have been issued to the truck driver has not been reported. It's also unclear whether Laurel officials have identified Yard Office Road as a priority corridor for pedestrian and cyclist safety improvements. A three-year traffic safety report presented to officials in nearby Billings documented 67 crashes involving a possible injury, nine suspected serious injuries and five fatal crashes between October 2022 and April 2025, according to Billings TrailNet. Statewide, no sourced roadway-fatality figure is provided here.
For now, Raye's family is focused on the small signs of progress emerging from her hospital bed in Seattle, as she continues the long process of regaining consciousness and communicating with the people around her.
