Girl, 5, awakens from coma following car crash with Chiefs assistant coach Britt Reid

While the girl’s family was overjoyed that she’d woken up, they said she has ‘a long road to recovery’

(Getty Images)

Ariel Young, the five-year-old girl injured in a car crash involving Kansas City Chiefs assistant coach Britt Reid, has awakened from her coma, her family said.

“While she is awake she is not the same happy free spirited little girl she was before this horrific crash,” Tiffany Verhulst, Ariel’s cousin, wrote on a GoFundMe page on Tuesday. “She has a long road to recovery and the things that were once easy for her will no longer be.”

Ariel had been in the coma for eleven days, following a February 4 accident in which police say Reid crashed his pickup truck into two vehicles. Two other people were also injured in the crash, including Ariel’s four-year-old cousin, Julianna.

While the girl’s family expressed relief that she had woken up, they also lamented the seriousness of her injuries.

“We are so happy she is awake yet so sad at the toll this took on her body and brain,” Verhulst wrote on the GoFundMe, which has raised more than $500,000. “We are thankful for the continued support and love for her right now. No family or child should ever have to go through this.”

Kansas City police and the NFL are both investigating the crash. In a search warrant, one police officer said Reid had bloodshot eyes and smelled of alcohol at the scene of the accident, according to KCTV5. Reid allegedly told him he’d had two to three drinks that night.

Reid’s father, the Chiefs’ head coach Andy Reid, offered his sympathies to the Young family in his first public comments after the Super Bowl, which took place just three days after the crash.

“My heart goes out to all those involved in the accident, in particular the family with the little girl fighting for her life,” the coach said on February 7, adding that he couldn’t comment much on the case beyond that. “But just from a human standpoint, man, my heart bleeds for everyone involved in that.”

Britt Reid did not join the Chiefs at the Super Bowl. After the crash, he was placed on administrative leave, and his contract has since expired.

“Our primary concern is for the young girl, her family, and the others who were injured,” a spokesman for the NFL told USA Today Sports. “We will continue to monitor developments and when law enforcement has completed its review, we will address this matter and take any appropriate action.”