Marine Corps veteran goes home months after surviving crash as Miami-Dade police officer

MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – Surveillance video shows the body of a police motor officer flying about 20 feet into the air and about 30 feet away from the sports utility vehicle that struck his Miami-Dade Police Department motorcycle.

Officer Matthew Larsh, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran, landed on the street’s concrete — on his legs, hips, and arms. Miami-Dade Fire Rescue personnel rushed him to Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center. Surgeons quickly placed a stent in the aorta, the main artery that carries blood away from the heart to the rest of the body.

Larsh’s injuries: Blunt force trauma to the aorta of the heart, a hematoma on the pancreas, abrasions to his bladder, a pelvic fracture; a tibial plateau fracture on his left leg; compound fractures to his left foot and the patella on his left knee; multiple lacerations down to the bones on his right leg, hands, and arms; and an open dislocated compound fracture of the right elbow.

“I was completely broken,” Larsh said.

Larsh was intubated and sedated in the Intensive Care Unit. He woke up about two-and-a-half days later, and he couldn’t remember the April 21st collision at Northwest 36 Street and 53 Avenue. More surgeries followed. And after about four months of care, Larsh was finally able to go home on Friday.

Through hard work and perseverance, Larsh moved on from a wheelchair to a walker and finally to the crutches he left with.

Miami-Dade Police Director Alfredo “Freddy” Ramirez III clapped as Larsh used the crutches to leave the therapeutic rehabilitation building he will have to visit regularly for therapy and physical rehabilitation. A group of officers joined in the celebration.

“I count my blessings to just have been, to come away with what I have come away with,” Larsh said. “I believe that God will never give you more than you can handle.”

Larsh, who was assigned to the Kendall District, was on his way to in-service motor training in Miami Springs when the driver of the SUV caused the head-on collision while attempting to make a U-turn, police said.

Larsh told colleagues that when he saw the surveillance video, he was convinced that his survival was short of “a miracle” and he felt “grateful.”

“It’s terrifying to know that that was me,” Larsh said on Friday.

Larsh was looking forward to having home-cooked chicken parmigiana with his family at home. His goal, he said, is to be able to return to serving and protecting Miami-Dade residents as a motorman again, and he hopes to defy expectations and do so before the anniversary of the crash in 2023.

“We don’t lay down and take it,” Larsh said. “We keep going forward.”

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