ELLENDALE — On a Sunday morning  last November, life as Dana Standke knew it changed forever.

Standke, an 11-year-old fifth-grader at NRHEG Elementary School, was helping her family with farm work on their rural Ellendale property. She was helping to unload corn when the sleeve of her coat got caught in an auger and pulled Standke into the piece of farming equipment, entangling her arm in the spiral.

After 911 was called, emergency personnel from Ellendale and Owatonna cut off a 16-inch piece of the auger with Standke’s arm still attached to it, worrying that she would bleed to death if they separated her arm from the auger. She was then flown to St. Marys Hospital in Rochester.

After a few hours, doctors had to amputate Standke’s arm about three inches below her elbow. They then took muscle from her shoulder and skin grafts from her thigh to graft onto her elbow. Since the ordeal, Standke has undergone four different surgeries, with one of them lasting about 10 hours.

Standke has since been fitted with a prosthetic arm that she has named “Bob,” according to her mother’s cousin Cindi Bartness.

Bartness has planned a number of benefits in the area over the years, and said she was approached to help plan one for Standke’s family to help defray medical costs. Planning began in January, and she said it was “a blessing” that she was asked as it turned out she was related to Standke.

Standke lives in Ellendale with her parents Shelly Standke and Dan Enzenauer. She also has a brother, Andrew.

Bartness helped organize a benefit for the family that took place March 22 at NRHEG Elementary, in which she said over 1,100 people participated in. The benefit started with a pancake breakfast and was followed by silent and live auctions, along with a bake sale and an opportunity for children to meet the Easter bunny.