OP teen killed in snowy I-70 crash had overcome severe limits of autism in childhood
The 16-year-old Overland Park boy who was killed Thursday on a snow-covered Interstate 70 in western Kansas was autistic and his parents were credited with getting him specialized help to lead a more fulfilling life.
Jaxon Buerge is also considered an inspiration for the Bill & Virginia Leffen Center for Autism in Joplin, Mo., where the family formerly lived.
“Even though Jaxon’s life was short, he made an incredible impact in this world, and that legacy — that of the Leffen Center — is one very real example of his impact,” said center president and CEO Paula Baker, as quoted in The Joplin Globe.
Jaxon Buerge (pronounced BUR-gee) and his parents, 42-year-old Justin Buerge and 40-year-old Trisha Buerge, and 9-year-old brother, Maxwell Buerge, were headed west about 10 miles east of Colby, Kan., at 10 a.m. Thursday when their 2018 GMC Yukon was struck in the rear by a semi truck.
The impact spun the Yukon 180 degrees so it was facing east, pinned by the semi, with the driver’s side door against the guardrail.
The crash occurred as Winter Storm Eboni was bringing blizzard conditions to western Kansas and just as the Kansas Department of Transportation was closing I-70 between Colby and WaKeeney. The crash location was within that section, but the Kansas Highway Patrol report does not specifically say if weather contributed to the crash.
The driver of the semi was not injured but all four members of the Buerge family, all of whom had been wearing seatbelts, were taken to the Logan County Hospital. There Jaxon was pronounced dead. The other three were injured. A nurse at the hospital notified Jaxon’s parents that he had died.
Jaxon had been diagnosed with autism at 20 months.
“As a mother, you know something is not right,” Trisha Buerge said later in a YouTube video that was made after Jaxon had graduated from an intense program at the Center for Autism at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio. She took her son there while Justin Buerge stayed behind to work in the family’s then-home of Joplin, Mo.
Before the behavioral therapy Jaxon could not feed himself, could not play and had no language skills. Afterward, he was speaking and reading and interacting with others.
“This really wasn’t about my husband or I but Jaxon, and ultimately giving him a chance for life,” Trisha Buerge said in the video.
The Buerges’ story was featured in the Joplin Globe in 2006. Another Joplin Globe story in 2007 credited the Buerges for their part in helping to create the Ozark Center for Autism, now the Leffen Center.
“They brought back information about the (Cleveland) center and presented it to Gary Duncan, chief executive officer of the Freeman Health System,” the article said. “State Sen. Gary Nodler, R-Joplin, was credited for helping secure annual state funding for the center. Leslie Sinclair, director of the Cleveland Clinic Center for Autism, traveled to Joplin for the opening.”
The Buerges moved to Overland Park several years ago.