BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. – It took emergency crews nearly an hour to pull Jenny Hortman from the wreckage of her crushed car. Four years and 18 surgeries later, the spaceflight photographer is finally nearing the end of a long, grueling recovery after a crash that nearly took her life.

Hortman was driving on State Road 407 in Brevard County, heading to photograph a rocket launch, when a U-Haul truck plowed into her vehicle. The collision left her with catastrophic injuries.

“Life is so fragile… and to have almost lost that… it was difficult,” Hortman said.

Her list of injuries was extensive — broken bones throughout both legs, a damaged foot, multiple fractured ribs, trauma to the left side of her face, collapsed lungs and a ruptured spleen.

“I ended up breaking almost everything in my le

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