SHERBURNE – The charity organization Lights for Tikes is spreading the Christmas spirit through its annual holiday attraction at 11 Church Street in Sherburne from Nov. 29 at 5:30 p.m. through Dec. 29 at 9:30 p.m. Donations collected by Lights for Tikes this holiday season will be used for Megan Viera, a Sherburne teen who suffered severe injuries after being in a car accident.
Megan Viera was a passenger in a two-car accident on August 8 in Eaton. Viera was a passenger of Cody M. Smith’s vehicle, one of the cars in the accident. Smith was driving south on Cole Rd. with three passengers and failed to stop at the intersection where Cole Rd. and State Route 26 meet. Smith’s car was struck by Sarah E. Rickey’s, 49, Iowa City, Iowa, vehicle heading north on State Route 26. All five people in the accident had injuries and went to the hospital, but Viera was in the most serious condition.
Viera was airlifted by helicopter to Upstate University Hospital in Syracuse. She was 18 years old at the time of the accident and had just graduated from high school a few months before. She endured a traumatic brain injury as a result of the accident.
“They removed part of the right side of Megan’s skull to relieve pressure,” said Rick Crowell, founder and organizer of Lights for Tikes. “She just started talking last week. She could not speak up until then. It was exciting, because you could tell she was frustrated with not being able to communicate. I was jumping up and down in church when I heard the news.”
Viera’s next goal is to be able to walk again.
Viera is in need of surgery, medical procedures, rehabilitation and physical therapy for her sustained injuries. The goal of this year’s Lights for Tikes event is to help Viera and her family with the expensive medical costs.
“You name it. She needs everything. There is still so much they have to do for her to recover,” said Crowell.
The Lights for Tikes holiday attraction displays over 45,000 Christmas lights, synchronized to modern upbeat Christmas music. The lights twinkle, fade and dance with the music. “People can even turn their radio to 107.5 FM to listen to the music while they are looking at the lights from the warmth of their car,” said Crowell. All the lights turn on at sundown, but the lights surrounding Viera’s donation box are lit day and night.
“There are eight control boxes with 16 channels and 120 sets of lights for each control. It’s over 160 hours of programming work. You have to program every fifth of a second for 128 channels down the board, all the way through the end of each song,” said Crowell.
