Last night Silent Planet’s touring van crashed on a patch of ice in Wyoming rolling off the side of the freeway. Luckily no one was severely hurt, but the van was destroyed which put the band in a hard financial situation where they had to turn to their fans for help.
They posted:
“Early this morning, while driving through rural Wyoming, our driver hit a patch of ice and our vehicle spun and flipped, rolling off the side of the freeway.
Each of us awoke up at different moments after the crash, yelling for each other, scattered wherever the crash had flung us upside-down. We were relieved to find that we were all conscious/alive. Most of the group was miraculously unharmed. I (Garrett) found that blood was streaming from my head. Using whatever we could find laying around the van, we clothed ourselves pressed the wound to stem the bleeding until first responders came.
I was rushed to the hospital where they stopped the bleeding, took MRI’s, and stapled my head wound back together.
Everyone in the band is feeling it, but we are extremely fortunate to all be able to walk away from this crash… and not have to bury a friend.
Over these last hours we’ve received innumerable messages of support, and we just want to say thank you for your concern. We’ve been touring for 10 years, and I suppose we should be thankful that this is our first (and hopefully last) wreck of our history.
We are grateful to be alive, but also contending with the fact that this is going to put us in a seemingly impossible financial situation. Only a day into tour, we’ve yet to generate any income from this tour, and are still financially in the red. So we’ve decided to ask for help: There’s a link in our bio with a number of ways that folks can support us. If you want to hit the link or share, we would massively appreciate your act of kindness.
If you made it to the end of this, thank you for reading. I hope it all makes sense, to be honest my head is still throbbing and everything is kind of spinning. But please know that we love this community and are truly indebted to the radical hospitality we’ve been shown over the years. Take care, tell your people you love them, and be consumed.”
Fans were fast to help and the band was able to reach their goal, even far-exceed it in less than 18 hours. The band was overwhelmed with the fans generosity and Garret russel their lead singer posted a thank you video. He also wrote:
“Filming this video wasn’t easy because I was holding back tears of gratitude… and trying to get my lips to properly form vowels shapes despite the 15 degree air in the wreckage of the place that was our home. But here it is:
Yesterday we experienced a miracle. Of course, the circumstances were far less than ideal, but in the aftermath of our van rolling down a snowy embankment, one by one we called out and hear each other’s voices.
Today we’ve experienced another miracle: You. The GoFundMe page hasn’t even been up for a day and we’ve already far-exceeded our goal. The money that has come in has been enough to pay the many expenses required to get back on the road… and now it appears that there’s to cover the expenses associated with future transportation.
This is not the first time our band has been on the receiving end of incredible generosity… but this is the most astounding and overwhelming. I doubt we could ever say thank you enough, but we’ll try. Thank you so much. Thank you to the ends of the earth and back.
We’ve closed the GoFundMe, but please know that we will never forget what happened here over the last day. Also, we will be sending a mass message to every GoFundMe contributor that includes a brief form. If you have a moment, we’d love for you to fill it out so we can collect addresses and send out a small token of our gratitude. We love all. Thanks for being the most hospitable community in earth.
And for anyone who might ask how they can best support, feel free to come out to a show or grab a shirt. But please know that we are back on track as a band… and it’s all thanks to you.
More sounds to come. Be consumed”
