BIMINI – Residents awoke yesterday to an overcast sky and the grim reality that every family on the island had lost a relative either by blood or marriage in Monday’s fatal plane crash.
Throughout the island there is no resident who did not have either a friend or relative on Chalk’s 101 flight, which exploded shortly after take-off in Miami, killing all 20 people on board, including at least 11 Biminites.
Prime Minister Perry Christie, who together with a delegation of Cabinet ministers visited the island yesterday, said the crash constituted the single largest loss of Bahamian life in recent history.
“In 1935, this community suffered the loss of ten people after a hurricane. But unlike the hurricane, this tragedy was so unexpected. It impacts this community significantly. It is a tremendous tragedy and everyone feels it,” he said.
Mr Christie said he would be meeting with his Cabinet and spiritual advisers to discuss and plan a national day of mourning for the victims.
Hardest hit by the tragedy was Rose Stuart, who lost five family members in the crash.
Mrs Stuart’s daughter Sabrena Dean and her husband Barto Dean, their four-month-old daughter Sabrea, her sister Jackie Stuart and her 18-year old niece Niesha Fox (Jackie’s daughter) were all on the plane. Family and friends yesterday said that Ms Stuart was in seclusion after spending an agonising night overcome with grief.
“She has to be sedated,” a neighbour told The Tribune, adding that he could hear her screams throughout Monday night.
The air was thick with grief as residents gathered in small pockets at restaurants and at the homes of families most affected.
While residents spent a frantic Monday waiting for news and hoping for the best, Tuesday was spent trying to come to terms with the reality of such profound loss.
Many residents said they expect the state of shock to continue until after the bodies are brought home.
“On Monday it was all just so confusing, so many names were being mentioned and noone knew for sure who was on board and who was not,” Mildred Sherman told The Tribune.
Mrs Sherman, who lost her daughter-in-law Sophie Hinsley-Sherman, her baby granddaughter Bethany and her great nephew Jervis Stuart Jr in the crash, said she was certain her loved ones were dead as soon as she saw the news on television.
“Some thought it was the Nassau flight, and not the Bimini flight. But I knew, I had a feeling as soon as saw it on the television,” she said.
As she was talking to The Tribune, her young grandsons Damien and Kendrea Sherman, sons of the deceased Mrs Hinsley-Sherman, fought to hold back tears.
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Bimini was left devastated after the ill-fated Chalk’s Flight 101 crashed into the sea off Miami on Monday afternoon at 2.30pm. Eyewitnesses described seeing fire coming from the plane before it went down.
Amateur video aired on US television yesterday showed the Chalk’s plane, model Grumman G-73T, dive toward the ocean, followed by a fireball. Mark Rosenker, acting chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, which conducts investigations into accidents, told US reporters that it appeared as if a portion of the plane broke away from the fuselage and that the aircraft was “fairly mangled”.
Yesterday, rescue workers were able to raise parts of the plane’s wreckage, which will be transferred to a hangar to undergo further investigations.
Prime Minister Christie emphasised yesterday that it is now important to “keep an eye on the review” of the crash.
“(Chalk’s) represented a lifeline for this economy for so long,” he said.
Many residents used the airline several times a month to travel to the US for shopping.
Mr Christie said the government will ensure that everything possible is done to assist affected families in their time of need.
He said it was important for everyone to come together to support relatives of the victims, and help Bimini “rise up again.”
“We are here to ensure that takes place. Whatever it takes we will stand by them,” he said.
The unconfirmed list of identified victims is:
Sabrena and Barto Dean, their four-month-old daughter Sabrea; Don Smith and his 15-month-old grandson Jarvis Jr; Jackie Levarity and her 18year-old daughter Niesha Fox; sisters Genevieve Ellis and Salome Rolle; Sophie HinsleySherman and her baby daughter Bethany; Carol Burt, an American and long-term resident of Bimini, who gave pottery lessons to children of the island; Sergio Danguillecourt, great-great grandson of Bacardi founder Don Facundo Bacardi, and his wife Jacqueline Kriz-Danguillecourt.
A Chalk’s plane yesterday flew relatives from Bimini to Miami to identify the victims.
By CARA BRENNEN, FELICITY INGRAHAM and KARIN HERIG
The Tribune – Nassau, Bahamas
