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QUESTION: Whatever happened to Kathryn "Katie" McKenzie, the 11-year-old Kailua girl who was critically injured when a car plowed into her on a downtown Honolulu sidewalk in 1997?
ANSWER: McKenzie, now 27, lives in Tulsa, Okla., where she works at a day care center, plays rugby and has an active lifestyle despite carrying the physical effects of her injuries.
"I would say I like doing everything and anything," she said in a phone interview. "I feel that I should be able to do whatever everyone else can do, so in that way, I push myself to succeed in whatever I choose to do."
McKenzie wears a brace on her left leg, has a rod in her right leg, has a plate fused to her pelvis, and no longer has her spleen and one of her kidneys.
On Aug. 8, 1997, she was walking with her father, Roger McKenzie, and her brother Rory when a car went out of control on Bishop Street. It hit a car in the left lane, veered right across four lanes, and barreled through the King Street intersection and onto the sidewalk in front of the Bank of Hawaii building.
The car then hit Katie McKenzie, who was walking ahead of her father and brother to a King Street bus stop.
Jerry Wilson, a 51-year-old Honolulu attorney, said at the time that he blacked out at the wheel after taking a prescription blood-pressure medication.
McKenzie was in a coma for about a month. She spent almost four months in hospitals and another eight months in outpatient rehabilitation. Her family moved to Texas about a year after the accident.
In 2007 she graduated from Austin College in Sherman, Texas, with a degree in classical civilizations and a minor in biology. She has studied in Italy, participated in a six-week archaeological dig in Pompeii and gone on a medical mission to South Africa, she said.
McKenzie returned to Honolulu in 2008 for a summer internship at the Bishop Museum, her first time back to the islands.
"It was very interesting and I had a great time in Hawaii," she said. "I didn’t stay very far from where the accident was and I actually went by there. I have no recollection of (the accident), though."
McKenzie received her master’s degree in museum studies from the University of Toronto in 2009.
She is preparing for the Aquarium Run half-marathon in Tulsa on Saturday and has participated in marathons and triathlons.
"Obviously, the accident changed her life forever," said her mother, Carole McKenzie. "She has to live with the consequences every day. At the same time, she’s done such a great job of coping with it. She has a very full life and we’re very proud of her."
——— This update was written by Marcie Kagawa. Suggest a topic for “Whatever Happened To …” by writing Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., Suite 7-210, Honolulu 96813; call 529-4747; or email cityeditors@staradvertiser.com.
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