LOS ANGELES — A teenage girl born without a hand was surprised with a cutting-edge bionic hand after her friends started a campaign on Twitter.
Torri Biddle, 18, grew up having a fairly normal life. She learned to play sports and even though her right arm ended about six inches below her elbow, she managed to have fun, play soccer and basketball, and do what most other teens could do.
But the one thing she wanted more than anything was to be able to hug her dad, Joe, with both arms. So her friends decided to start a Twitter campaign to help her get a hand.
Thousands of people starting sharing Torri's story using the hashtag #HandForTorri. The campaign caught the attention of The Buried Life, a group of men who travel the world and help make stranger’s dreams come true. They were able to get the Hangar Clinic, one of the top-notch prosthetics companies, to donate one of its $150,000 full responsive bionic hands.
Torri attended the Invisible Children's Fourth Estate Summit at UCLA and was invited onto the stage by The Buried Life. In front of the large crowd, she was stunned when they told her she would be receiving a bionic hand.
"Your friends contacted us," said a member of The Buried Life onstage in the video. "They said that before they die, what they want more than anything in the world is to get you a custom-fit bionic arm."
Two weeks later, Torri was able to get fitted for her hand. A video produced by The Buried Life shows Torri's first moments with her new hand. One of the first things she does when the hand is on is go and hug her dad.
"This is what she has always wanted her whole life," Joe Biddle said in the video. "For her to overcome everything she has in her life, and now to finally get something like this, now she's opened up a whole new world for her."
The Buried Life told Buzzfeed that Torri is using her new hand every day while working at her job at an ice cream shop.
You can view the full video of the #HandforTorri story on The Buried Life’s YouTube page. Hangar Clinics has pledged to donate a bionic arm to another deserving teen if Torri's video gets 1 million views.