A community effort has raised more than $100,000 for a Navy SEAL seriously injured in a truck crash in Flower Mound.
Dan Licardo was pinned inside his truck after the crash, at the intersection of Farm-to-Market Road 2499 and Sagebrush Drive. Relatives said he suffered a seizure.
Girlfriend Christin Menking said Licardo was on his way to pick up his son when the crash occurred. Her two children were with him. They were not seriously hurt.
Menking comforted him at the scene, where she said Dan's first concern was about the kids.
"That speaks volumes about the type of man Dan is," she said. "He wanted to know how everyone else was first."
Licardo was airlifted to Parkland Hospital in Dallas, where the Navy SEAL is now recovering. To save his life, doctors had to remove both his legs.
Friends and relatives credit first responders and the hospital team with saving Licardo's life.
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"If it wasn't for our first responders, this would be a different interview," said friend J.P. Dinell. "We wouldn't have our brother here."
Dinell and others – many of them military veterans – have held vigil at the hospital for days, staying by Licardo's side. The support, they say, will be critical in the coming months.
"You have two roads you can take," said Tina Hurley, who met Licardo at Adaptive Training Foundation in Carrollton, where he volunteered and she underwent rehabilitation after her own left leg was amputated. "You can use what you've been through as a crutch, or you can use what you've been given as a purpose."
As of late Friday afternoon, more than 1,000 donors had given over $110,000 to a GoFundMe effort in Licardo's name. The money will help pay medical expenses. A Navy SEALs fund has raised an additional $26,000.
"What we've experienced with the goodwill of people who want to support Dan is just evidence of the goodness and goodwill that exists out there," said Clint Bruce, another long-time friend.
