The Copeland family is making every minute count.
For Kyle and Whitney Copeland and their four children, time together is their most valuable treasure. They have spent years moving with the military, seeing Kyle through a brain injury in 2016, and now are recovering from traumatic injury due to a severe fire and explosion that occurred on their bus-turned-RV on Dec. 27, 2021.
Kyle grew up in Tooele County, Utah, and spent eight years serving as a linguist in the Air Force, while Whitney grew up in upstate New York and has a background in nursing. The family traveled together a lot. And Life was perfect and happy.
“He was in the military, so we traveled down quite a bit. Kyle really enjoyed that. That was a good part of our life,” Whitney told The Epoch Times. “And then, the brain injury happened.”
The RV Dream
Kyle suffered a frontal lobe brain injury seven years ago, and their life changed substantially.The family decided to homeschool their four children, allowing them all to work around dad’s abnormal sleep schedule. The family spent the mornings together doing their fun activities, such as riding bikes or hiking, and then doing schoolwork in the afternoon. They had the flexibility they needed.
Then, a new idea was born. The Copelands, who had tinkered with the idea of renovating a tiny home, sold their homes and decided upon a life of travel—free of the weight of mortgage and home ownership.
The Copelands purchased a retired bus from a Washington company in March 2019 for $15,000 and, in their backyard, gutted it down to the bones. With Kyle’s construction experience, and the help of YouTube, they turned the bus into an RV over two years, adding $50,000 in restoration features, including new plumbing, electric, solar panels, and a propane heating system. Then, they hit the road.
Their journey started in Utah, proceeded to New York, and then took them straight North to Maine.
“Maine is absolutely one of our favorite memories on the bus. And we spent about a month there and traveled, and then we made our way back out west,” Whitney recalled.
The Fire
Around 10:00 p.m., the evening of Dec. 21, 2021, the Copelands parked their bus-RV outside of a friends’ home. Kyle and Whitney exited the bus to hook up their trailer. The four children were still on the bus. As the parents hooked up the trailer, their youngest daughter, Emree, left the bus noticeably unsettled.“You could hear her voice, something was wrong, like something happened,” Whitney said. “So I dropped my flashlight and went running.”
By the time Whitney reached the door, the bus was already burning. She screamed for Kyle. “Kyle ran straight into the flames,” she said.
Their middle son, Kade, had escaped to safety through a small window 10 feet off of the ground. But, the youngest son, Krew, and the eldest daughter, Pepper, stood stunned in the back of the bus between the bunkbeds. Kyle ran into the flames and pulled his two children out. In the meantime, Whitney shouted for her neighbor to call 911.
“It took them only five to eight minutes to get there,” Whitney said of the first responders.
Seconds after the entire family had escaped the bus, the propane tank exploded, burning the whole structure with it. The family, though suffering severe injury, was safe from the blast. “We were really lucky,” she said.
Rebuilding Life
Following the explosion, their 12-year-old daughter, Pepper, was life-flighted from the scene. During her flight, there was a 10-minute period when her heart stopped beating entirely. The first responders were able to revive the child and bring her back to life. The rest of the family were taken away by ambulance to receive medical care in Las Vegas.Since December, the road to recovery has been significant.
Kyle spent 30 days and underwent five surgeries at UMC Hospital in Las Vegas, at the time of writing. Kyle is home recovering, but still anticipating further surgery for the release of scar tissue. “They’re hopeful that he may be able to see out of his left eye completely,” Whitney said, although his sight is still fuzzy.
Four-year-old Krew had 25 percent of his body burned, and stayed in the pediatric ICU for 38 days, undergoing nine surgeries. He received extensive skin-graft treatment on his entire face and is home recovering with his father. At the time of interview, he has four more surgeries scheduled.
“His hands are contracting and so it’s very difficult for him to use his hands. His mouth and nose are shrinking, so he can’t breathe out of his nose very well. It’s very difficult to eat. He can’t open his mouth very wide. He’s a 4-year-old little boy. He just wants to play all day,” Whitney explained, adding that her son has “a newfound disability… he’s not able to do everything that he was able to do before.”
Pepper, 12, suffered the worst of the trauma. She had 52 percent of her body burned in the fire, and has undergone 33 surgeries so far. The first was simply to stabilize her and keep her alive. Pepper received grafting on her legs with her own skin, and has taken a few steps with a walker.
The family anticipates that after Pepper’s hospital stay, there would be a year of meeting with physical therapy, occupational therapy, and plastic teams. She will need to be fitted with full-body compression garments, which she will wear for up to a year.
“She’s been bed-bound for two months. We’re getting there,” Whitney said.
Their Strength Is in Their Unity
Currently, the family is renting a home in Las Vegas while Pepper recovers at the University Medical Center Hospital in Las Vegas. A GoFundMe has been set up for the family’s medical and living expenses.Kade, 10, and Emree, 6, are not physically injured, Whitney said, “but we know there’s going to be a lot of emotional and mental stuff that we need to work through with them.” Right after the accident, they were taken to the home of a family member, and were separated from their immediate family for two months.
“That was very traumatic, but they’re doing well. They’re thriving. Kade is playing on a soccer team right now. And Emree, we got her signed up for violin. I wanted to do something that felt normal for them.”
Despite the recent accident and adversity, the Copeland family is not giving up. “We would like to get a little homestead and settle down for a while,” Whitney said. “We weren’t done traveling, so we feel like there’s something like that in the future.”
Wherever the family decides to end up, they will do it together. Their strength is in their unity. And their time is precious.
