PENDLETON, Ind. — Andrea Vellinga was so close to the Indiana State Fairground’s stage, where Sugarland was about to perform, that she could touch it. She was thrilled that she might be able to reach out and graze lead singer, Jennifer Nettles, her idol.

But her proximity to the stage and the severe storm and winds Saturday night are what led to the head injury that put her in critical condition at Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis.

The 30-year-old Pendleton mother was one of more than 40 who were injured when the stage collapsed onto itself and the crowd. Five people died as a result of the disaster.

Vellinga, a 1999 Pendleton Heights graduate, had dreamt of being in the front row to watch her favorite band, and she was finally getting to do it.

After the opening act left the stage, Vellinga and her friends stood around talking and laughing about how close they were to the performers, said Kendra Stock, Vellinga’s best friend since childhood. She was at the concert with her.

Then a man came on stage and informed everyone that a storm was coming, but that the show would go on, she said. If it got dangerous, people would be evacuated.

“He walked off stage, and within seconds, we looked over to the left of the stage and saw a huge dust storm,” said Stock, 30, Pendleton. “It was twirling toward us. The top of the stage, the tarp, started to go up and down and we saw the stage moving.”

One of their friends, Hailey Padgett, 30, Pendleton, screamed: “Oh my god! Run!”

The group of friends scattered, running toward the grandstand and away from the stage. Many other audience members did the same as screams filled the air.

“I looked back and saw it falling on me,” Stock said. “I just made it. It scraped my back and I fell to the ground.”

Stock drew herself up and immediately began looking for her friends. One by one they found each other. But Vellinga was nowhere to be seen.

“I was running back and forth. People were down everywhere. It was a nightmare,” she said. “And then I just stood there, looking for my best friend. She was nowhere.”

After an exasperating search, the group of friends went to Methodist Hospital because they had heard the injured were being taken there. Additionally, some of them needed medical treatment, though minor. The most injured, besides Vellinga, was Hillary Holt, 30, Pendleton, who received a small skull fracture and cuts on her face. She was treated and released Sunday, Stock said.

When they arrived at Methodist, they found out Vellinga was already there.

Apparently, a steel beam fell on her and crushed her skull. Her shoulder bone was broken and several vertebrae were cracked. Doctors took her into surgery right away, Stock said. She remained medically sedated at the hospital Monday, she said.

The hospital has been filled with friends and family members arriving from near and far. Many others have been covering Vellinga’s Facebook page with dozens of prayers and words of hope and love.

Vellinga’s brother, Tyler Voss, has been updating people through Facebook posts. In a long message he wrote Sunday night, he reminded people that Vellinga is a fighter and will get through this. He thanked people for their prayers and concerns, and urged them to keep it up, not only for Vellinga, but for others who were also injured.

“I also want to thank the people at the concert who rescued my dear sister,” Voss wrote. “I don’t know who you are or if you may be reading this, but thank you for your selflessness and courage to find it within yourself the resilient fervor to lift her limp body from the collapsed rubble and get her to Methodist as quickly as you did.”

It wasn’t until Monday that Vellinga’s family and friends learned how she ended up at Methodist, where she remains in critical condition.

A woman approached the family at the hospital and told them she had been at the concert, sitting at the very top of the grandstand when the stage crumbled. She sprinted down the steps and onto the disaster zone, her husband right alongside her.

The woman is a surgery resident at Methodist Hospital, and her husband an EMT. Paramedics gave them a bag of supplies and they attended to Vellinga.

“They began working on her within two minutes. If they wouldn’t have, she (Vellinga) wouldn’t be with us today,” Stock said, her voice cracking. “They rushed her to an ambulance and begged to put her on there. She needed to be one of the first ones out.”

Her husband, Mike Vellinga, has spent every night at the hospital, and their 4-year-old daughter, Lydia, doesn’t quite understand what happened to her mother.

“She is one of the most incredible people I’ve met in my entire life,” Stock said. “She is a real good-hearted person, a hard worker, extremely outgoing. She is the best friend you could ever wish for. She is an amazing mother who is extremely involved in her daughter’s life.”

Doctors have said the next 72 hours are crucial to Vellinga’s recovery, Stock said.

“We need continued prayers,” she said. “We need a miracle.”

To help

• To help cover Andrea Vellinga’s medical costs and her family’s stay at the hospital’s hotel, donations can be made to her church at www.iamcatalyst.org. Once on the website, click on Catalyst Online and click on Vellinga Support.

Contact Melanie Hayes: 648-4250 or melanie.hayes@heraldbulletin.com