Kim Gervais, a survivor of the 2017 Las Vegas massacre, has died.
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Gervais was left paralyzed after a gunman opened fire at the Route 91 Harvest music festival on Oct. 1, 2017 in the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. Fifty eight people were killed and hundreds were injured.
On Friday, Gervais became the 59th person to die from the shooting when her heart stopped due to the stress her injuries had caused her body, KPTV reported.
"She hurt. Even though she was paralyzed from the neck up, she could feel all the pain," Gervais’ sister, Dena Sarvela, told KPTV. "There was scrap metal still in her because he used exploding bullets."
Sarvela told the station that Gervais had attended the festival with two of her friends, one of whom was killed that day.
Gervais wasn’t able to return to California because of injuries for nearly a year, her sister said, and the shooting changed her life completely.
“She lost her zest for life because of it, because of the shooting, because of her injuries that she sustained," Sarvela told KPTV. "It was hard to be that same person that we all know and love."
Sarvela added that her sister, a business owner and mother of two, had hoped to retire and begin traveling before she was shot.
“She was ready to just go abroad and enjoy life, like she should have, and it was snatched from her. She worked her life, and butt off for – just to go enjoy, you know, and she doesn’t get that, she doesn’t get that chance,” Sarvela told the station.
The family plans to take Gervais’ ashes on a road trip across the U.S. to honor her. Sarvela said Gervais' husband died in the early 2000s.
“I also know she was missing her husband very, very much, and that’s what gives me hope – that she’s with him right now,” she said.
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