‘Shocking and disturbing’ - Portland woman reflects on crash which claimed her brother’s life
Published:Saturday | December 19, 2020 | 12:16 AMGareth Davis Sr/Gleaner Writer
Rio Grande Valley, Portland:
Twelve years ago, Norma Taylor lost her brother, Winston Taylor, when a truck laden with agricultural produce crashed in Portland, killing him and 13 others as they headed to Kingston.
Taylor said that, while most of the persons on the truck were aiming to sell produce at the Coronation Market, Winston was headed to Kingston to purchase building material to construct his house.
She recalled that, on the fateful day, December 19, 2008, she prepared and served him his last meal, not knowing she would not see him alive again. The truck would later plunge into a ravine, claiming the lives of 14 of the 21 persons aboard.
“It was hard. Mi couldn’t believe because mi lost one brother di same year, too, inna August,” she recounted.
“Mi couldn’t believe when mi hear. It was shocking and disturbing,” Taylor said, adding that she did not go into the ravine to look at the crash site.
When it was time to identify her brother’s body, she said she faced her most difficult moment.
“Di day when dem supposed to identify di body, a me everybody a push. Nobody nuh wah go fi go face it,” she said. “Mi cry really, and di hardest part a fi identify di body.”
On entering the room, she said, all the bodies were laid out on a piece of tarpaulin. She recalled one woman whose face was “flat out”.
The fatal accident triggered widespread mourning throughout the Rio Grande Valley as the nation was left in shock.
For Novlette Fuller-Francis, who survived the accident, life has never been the same.
Frequent nightmares of the traumatic crash forced her to seek out other avenues to provide for her family.
“You see, mi get likkle Christmas work now. A not even Christmas work. Mi get likkle road work, but otherwise me nuh work,” she told The Gleaner this week.
“Mi still a feel pain and mi go a doctor often and mi go a clinic,” she said. “Mi nuh get nutten. Others deh weh nuh get nutten either. Di fund weh set up, di fund used to feed the children dem weh a go a school, but a quite a while now nutten nah gwaan.”