"The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated."
- Mark
Twain
Saturday was the day I was scheduled to go to La Ceiba in order to preach at Zion Methodist Church Sunday. Jill and I had planned to take "the yacht" (a very nice large boat) that sails to La Ceiba Monday - Saturday at 11:00a.m. I received a call at 6:15a.m. Saturday morning. Mae Evelyn Zuniga had died at 6:30 the night before and they couldn't reach me (I was at Jill's room until late); could I postpone my trip for a 1:00 funeral and catch the 3:30 plane to La Ceiba? Of course I said yes.
The mosquitos are very bad on Utila right now and at the cemetery they were horrendous. The grave filled quickly and we were finished at 2:30 which I figured would leave enough time to change clothes. I made my way quickly home. I had just begun changing out of my suit when I heard a horn honk. Jill told me that Taxi Hank was parked on the street waiting. It was odd; I didn't expect to be picked up until after 3:00 and here was Hank honking for me at 2:45. Jill got him to wait as I finished dressing and threw my sweaty suit into my suitcase.
We arrived at the airport at 2:55. The inbound flight landed at 3:00, the time it was actually supposed to depart from La Ceiba! Jill and I were hurried on board, the only passengers on the 15 passenger SOSA plane. We were already in a La Ceiba taxi headed for town by 3:30, the time our flight was supposed to depart.
Some ticketed passengers did not make our "3:30" flight. Apparently SOSA decided to send their old four passenger single engine plane over to collect them. (And to deliver one or more passengers who had missed the flight from La Ceiba.)
At 4:30p.m. it was reported in La Ceiba that a SOSA plane had gone down in the sea. The pilot had radioed engine trouble from 3 miles out. A man in a dory witnessed the plane spiraling into the sea.
Meanwhile, in La Ceiba Jill and I had enjoyed an awesome Hawaiian pizza at Pizza Hut (my first fast food in 2 ½ months!) and had walked back to her hotel. There were several Utilians in the lobby of The Iberia (a favorite of islanders) in town for a soccer match. One of them took me aside and told me what had happened.
We collected my luggage from the lobby and walked down to Rev. Juan Simpson's nearby parsonage where I was to stay. I told him about the crash. During our conversation he received a phone call from the distraught Rev. Duncan of Roatan who thought that Jill and I were on that plane. Juan seemed to be having difficulty convincing Rev. Duncan that we were okay so he just handed over the phone to me!
After Jill and I said goodnight at the hotel I returned to find Juan with more news. Miss Kim Funez, the circuit steward on Utila, had called. Apparently they were observing a wake, so certain were they that their new minister and his fiancée had gone down in the sea. Everyone at the funeral seemed to know we were trying to make the day's last flight and someone had seen us go out to the airport; they reported that we were the ones who'd gone down. I figured that Taxi Hank and travel agent Frankie Morgan who had put us on the plane would know that we were fine. As it turns out, Frankie immediately took a boat out to the crash site. This left his father (Mr. Frank, whose agency it is) without knowing who had made the early flight. Miss Kim tried all the hotels in LaCeiba that Jill might have checked into; none had her listed. (We later discovered that the desk clerk had copied Jill's first and middle name, not her last name, from her passport.) Eventually the accurate information was spread. I really felt for my church people here, suffering this bad news on top of the death of a loved one just the night before.
I saw Jill off on her 8:45a.m. TACA flight Monday morning and boarded my 9:15 SOSA flight to Utila. As we flew out over the coast I noticed the pilot staring out the window to our left; I wondered if the small cargo vessel and two dive boats weren't still searching for wreckage and victims.
Taxi Hank picked me up upon returning to Utila Monday morning. He said, "You are a lucky man, Reverend." While Hank had picked up Jill and me, he had passed over ticketed passenger White Bush Hill, who would become a victim of the accident. Along with the SOSA pilot, other victims were the captain of the Imo Jay (the cargo vessel that I saw searching) and a woman from La Ceiba who had been living two years on the island. There could have been one more victim: At plane-side the woman handed her little daughter to her sister at the last moment, saying she didn't think she should go.
Bodies were recovered in the afternoon. Mr. White Bush Hill was a native of Utila; his body was returned to Utila by a fast dory at 6:15 that night. I assisted Church of God pastor Wilson Howell in the brief funeral held immediately at the cemetery. It is very rare to do a funeral after dark but with no embalming, time is of the essence and death had occurred over 48 hours earlier.
There are always the "why" and "what if" questions. The biggest
"why" in my mind concerns something I don't understand about air travel in
Central America... Why do planes leave early? (Our District President told
me that he was once driving out to the Belize City airport some 30 minutes
before departure time, only to see his TACA plane taxiing down the runway
for take-off!) In this case it actually did make some sense. SOSA was trying
to accommodate some 30 passengers who had reservations from La Ceiba to Utila
that afternoon. The plane Jill and I went out on was to return to Utila directly,
but the second group of tourists never showed up at the La Ceiba airport.
So SOSA sent the ill-fated four passenger plane back instead.