Community Unites To Get Dinkel On Her Feet

Twenty-Three-Year-Old Recovers After Accident

A freak accident leaves a 23-year-old woman facing a difficult road to recovery.
McKenna Dinkel severely injured her spinal cord while snow tubing with her family in December. A fundraiser was put on for her at Shotgun Sally’s.

Dozens of people showed up at Shotgun Sally’s to show support for McKenna. She’s worked as a kitchen manager and cook at several restaurants around town and now her former co-workers are helping her get back on her feet.

“It’s kind of a tight knit community. We all try to help each other out and that’s why we’re here, that’s why we’re doing this. Anything we can do to help her, she’s a beautiful girl and we love her,” says her former co-worker Ethan Hongess.

Shotgun Sally’s flooded with friends and family of McKenna.

“The amount of family and community that grows from it just obviously really pulls together when one of us is in need,” McKenna says.

After receiving painful botox shots in her legs just hours before her benefit, McKenna lit up the restaurant with smiles and tears. Hundreds of auction items were donated by businesses to raise money to help McKenna get better.

“Something like this does not happen with a single effort. This is a team effort and it’s a team that works together really well,” says McKenna’s aunt Kris Mickelson.

The money raised will go towards helping McKenna, who has been unable to work since her accident, get to the world renowned Craig Hospital in Denver for rehab.

“That’s pretty much my biggest goal right now,” McKenna says.

But her ultimate goal is to be walking on her own by August. McKenna selflessly says she wants to be better by her best friend’s wedding on August 15th so she can walk down the aisle on her own.

If you want to help McKenna, you can make a donation at gofundme.com/McKenna rehab.