NU freshman is killed on slopes during university-sponsored trip

An 18-year-old freshman at Northeastern University died over the weekend after she crashed her snow tube into a tree during a school-organized trip to Loon Mountain in New Hampshire, officials and relatives said yesterday.

Adrienne Devino of Addison, Vt., a former prom queen who told relatives she hoped to be president some day, was pronounced dead Saturday night at Speare Memorial Hospital in Plymouth, N.H., said Northeastern spokesman Fred McGrail and relatives.

McGrail said Devino died of internal injuries after her snow tube went off course during a night run with friends. He said several other students saw the accident about 8 p.m., but did not provide more detail.

A group of 50 students went on the annual overnight trip organized by the university's Resident Student Association, the official liaison between students who live in dorms and school administrators. Devino, a communications major, served as a public relations officer for the association. The students returned early from the three-day event because of the accident.

"She was just an awesome person," her mother, Linda Devino, said by telephone. "Her goal in life was to be president of the United States, and she really meant that . That's where she was headed."

Hospital officials told the Devinos that mountain officials said snow that had melted on the slope during the day had turned to ice by the time their daughter went snow tubing, something they said she had never done before on a mountain.

Mountain officials could not be reached for comment.

Before she could rent a snow tube, Devino had to sign a form releasing Loon from liability.

In 2004, after a woman from Warner sued the Ragged Mountain ski resort following a head injury she suffered while snow tubing, the New Hampshire Supreme Court ruled that ski areas are not protected from lawsuits from snow tubers.

A year later, the state Senate approved a bill that changed the way the previous law had been written, providing ski resorts with immunity from lawsuits for injuries involving snow tubing. It became law in summer 2005.

Devino's mother said the family was too busy grieving to consider a lawsuit.

On her MySpace page on the Internet, Devino listed some of the joys she found in life, such as "the fresh layer of peanut butter right when you open the new jar . . . eating way too much food at once, walking aimlessly around towns, running against the clock . . . the cold side of a pillow . . . [and] teaching people what yellow lights are all about."

"We love everybody, but we do as we please," she wrote. "Life's for livin', yeah, that's our philosophy."

Jeff Rosenstock, 19, a freshman at Northeastern, said Devino's friends were in mourning last night.

"She was known as a fun-loving, well-known, well-liked girl," he said. "She did so much for the school. She was involved in everything."

In high school, in addition to playing softball and soccer and occasionally snowboarding, she organized the yearbook, won a place in the honor society, became prom queen her junior year, and served as class president three years in a row, her mother said. She also was voted "best eyes" and "most likely to be president of the United States," her mother said.

"She did it all; she ran the school," her mother said.

At Northeastern, in addition to serving in the Resident Student Association, she was active in the Student Government Association and was helping organize Springfest, the Husky Hunt, and a host of seminars, lectures and fund-raising events.

"She just got involved in everything she heard about," said Rosenstock.