SASKATOON — Ryan Straschnitzki awoke on the road to the sound of his teammates’ groans.

The 18-year-old from Airdrie looked around and could see the carnage, but when he tried to get up and help his friends, his body refused to respond.

Only moments earlier the defenceman for the Humboldt Broncos was sitting safely inside the team bus. Like any teenager on a long drive, he was focused on his phone.

Suddenly, without warning, he heard the bus driver say, ‘Whoa’ just before the bus collided with a semi-truck.

“The hardest part is that he remembers everything,” Tom, Ryan’s father, told the Star.

“He was looking at all his buddies and wanted to help but he couldn’t move, so he waited for the first responders,” his mother Michelle said. “He was traumatized.”

Ryan suffered a broken clavicle, lacerations, blood in his lungs and a broken back. He’s also paralyzed from the chest down.

“He’s got two rods in his back and they had to remove a vertebra,” Michelle said. “It’s going to be a long road.”

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Ryan will spend another five days in ICU at Saskatoon’s Royal University Hospital before he is moved to its rehabilitation ward.

“He’s going to have to figure out his body now,” Michelle said, “and we have to figure out how to help him, how to take care of him, because we have absolutely no experience with any of this.”

Ryan’s parents said they often worried about their son spending so much time on the road, especially in light of two separate accidents this season in which hockey players in Western Canada died while driving to games.

“It’s been a horrible year,” Michelle said.

Ryan, or “Straz” to his friends, is determined to play hockey again and already has his sights set on sledge hockey, his parents said.

The oldest of four siblings, Ryan has always been strong minded, focused and pragmatic, said his parents.

Though Ryan’s long-term goal was a career in law enforcement, Michelle said, his hockey prospects were promising. He had hoped to secure a scholarship with a U.S. university.

Aerial footage shows the site of a bus crash near Tisdale, Saskatchewan, involving the Humboldt Broncos junior hockey team. The crash killed 14 people and injured 15 others. (The Canadian Press)

Ryan’s younger brothers both play hockey, and his sister plays soccer.

“We’re a sports family,” Tom said.

Back in Airdrie, folks are already working to help Ryan with his recovery.

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Cody Thompson, who had been helping Ryan with strength training since last summer, came up with the idea to design and sell hats through the Facebook group “Airdrie Dads,” which Thompson belongs to.

It features Straschnitzki’s green and gold jersey with his number 10 on the front and “#strazstrong” on the back.

“He was kind of a freak of nature with the things that he could do,” Thompson said. “There was strong, and then there was Straz strong.”

Sales of hats have already surpassed $11,000. Thompson is hoping to raise $100,000, since the specialized wheelchairs, ramps and vehicles that Straschnitzki may need are not cheap.

“Our biggest goal in mind is just to raise as much money as we possibly can, so that when some of these options are put in front of Ryan, he and his family can make the decisions that are based on what’s right for him, instead of what they can afford.”

—With files from Sara Mang

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