Up next, each year, there are about 6.1 million police-reported car crashes in the United States.

That's just under 17,000 per day.

Annually in the US, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reports roughly 40,000 deaths and three to five million injuries from these accidents.

"Carolina Impact's" Jason Terzis joins us with the story of a local singer still recovering from a violent accident one year ago.

- Well, her career was on the rise.

She sang in a church, had a local residency, was named Charlotte's Best Pop Artist by QC Nerve, and her songs were even picked up for a Netflix show.

Everything was progressing nicely for singer Lynsea Schurbon, and then an impaired driver ran a red light, and everything changed.

- Okay, I'm here to talk to you about my current reality, but in order to do that, I need to take you back just a little bit.

- [Jason] Lynsea Schurbon recently shared her story at the Charlotte's Creative Monthly Breakfast lecture series.

- Music has always been innately a part of how, or who I've known myself to be.

It was always a part of my life.

- [Jason] A musical journey, the seeds of which were planted by her father.

- He would pull me up on stage, and I would sing for the audience.

I absolutely loved it.

- [Jason] Originally from Texas, Lynsea earned her bachelor's degree in music business management from Berklee College of Music in Boston.

That led to a job on the Elevation Church worship team in Charlotte.

- I remember leaving Texas and telling my parents, "I'll see you in three months," and that was 10 and a half years ago, so.

I love it here.

- [Jason] But over time, Lynsea wanted to write and produce her own music.

- When I decided I wanted to pursue my dreams, I was like, "Great, how do I do that?"

I tried everything.

I put out a song every month, and then I experimented with posting on social media, with making merch, playing shows live, putting out songs in other languages, anything.

♪ Coffee at midnight ♪ ♪ No words just your eyes ♪ - [Jason] With a sound blending acoustic, folk, indie pop, and alternative rock, Lynsea slowly but surely started making inroads in the music biz.

- I've just been very stubborn throughout my whole life, like, "This is what I want to do, and I'm not going to stop trying until I see something happen."

♪ Now it's getting serious ♪ - [Jason] She landed a weekly residency at the Ritz-Carlton Uptown and was named QC Nerve's Best Local Pop Artist of 2024.

- I mean, I can still feel the emotion of it.

I felt relieved.

I felt validated.

I felt, I mean, ultimately encouraged to keep going.

- [Jason] And then the big breakthrough.

♪ Tonight I'll be yours if you want it ♪ - I got the call about my music being placed on Netflix reality shows.

- [Jason] Five of her original songs were featured on Netflix's spicy reality show "Temptation Island," one of which was on the show's trailer.

- And then I had to have my parents watch the trailer in the first episode.

They were like, "Oh.

Oh.

Oh."

- [Jason] For Lynsea and her budding career, everything was falling perfectly into place.

- I had been so desperate to create, to find myself as an artist for so long, and I finally felt like I was doing it, and it was getting noticed.

I felt encouraged to keep going.

I felt like, oh, someone's noticing.

My dreams can come true.

♪ You're a little late ♪ ♪ I'm already torn ♪ - [Jason] But then it happened: September 20, 2025.

- I don't have any memory of any of that.

I actually don't have memory of that entire day.

- [Jason] Lynsea was driving her sister to the airport following a weekend visit.

- An impaired driver who had just stolen a car ran his red light, and he ended up directly in my driver's side door.

The impact threw me toward the center of the car, and then she got whiplashed back towards me because of the side curtain airbag.

Because we both got thrown kind of toward the center of the car, we hit heads.

That impact shattered this center part of my skull.

I was taken immediately to surgery.

- [Jason] With brain swelling so bad, doctors were left with no choice but to cut out part of Lynsea's skull.

- So my hips were broken, severe brain injury, and they had to cut out half of my skull.

There was the area at the center that was shattered, and so they had to remove those pieces and really pick pieces out of my brain, which is crazy to think about.

I went home without half a skull.

Yeah, I think there was a disbelief that it was me.

- [Jason] Lynsea's road to recovery was a long one.

Undergoing two brain operations, spending a full month in the hospital, and, due to the severity of her brain injury, couldn't feel any emotion.

- I woke up and I was aware that I almost died, but I'm alive, and people I loved were with me.

I didn't really have a lot of emotional capacity to even process it, so I think my brain was protecting me from how scary all of it was.

- [Jason] A 3D-printed, custom-made, hard plastic skull piece was then attached to Lynsea's head to fill in the missing piece.

She then had to wear a helmet to protect it all.

- And then there's little brackets, metal titanium brackets, that connect, or they attach, my actual skull bone to the skull piece to hold it together.

Today is 10 months since my accident.

- [Jason] Just past the one-year mark now, Lynsea has made miraculous progress, even though her ability to sing and perform like she used to isn't quite there.

- I do notice improvements slowly every few months.

The struggle right now, though, is that if there is no vocal or melody to follow along to, I can't get the right notes out.

- [Jason] And as far as the guy who caused all this trauma is concerned, Lynsea, amazingly, has no ill will.

- My biological father was an addict, so I have an immense amount of compassion for addicts, so I don't want him to suffer.

I just want him to heal.

I don't want this to happen to anyone else.

- Lynsea, everybody.

Thank God that she's alive.

(audience cheering and clapping) - Now, Jason, I understand Lynsea is trying to raise awareness now.

- Yeah, trying to raise awareness and trying to create a little bit of a change.

Although side-center airbags were introduced by General Motors in 2013, but very few car models have them, mainly because it's not required.

Lynsea is trying to change that, starting a Change.org petition to mandate to get those side-center airbags in all cars.

As she says, "I may not be using my voice in the same way singing, but I am still using my voice."

So she's trying to get that change to get those.

You wouldn't think of those airbags in the middle of the car - - Right.

- So passenger and driver don't hit heads.

- Absolutely.

And it's interesting to know that she's trying to make a change using what happened to her to fix things for others.

- Absolutely.

- So good for Lynsea.

Thanks, Jason.