21797: (Hermantin)Sun-sentinel-Fatal turnpike crash ruins Haitians' mercy effort as foo (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>

Fatal turnpike crash ruins Haitians' mercy effort as food, clothes litter
road



By Pedro Ruz Gutierrez
Orlando Sentinel



Pinned for several minutes inside a smashed Ford F-150 pickup truck, Lorange
Jean-Jacques feared the worst.

It was about 3:15 a.m. Saturday, and a semitrailer truck had just flattened
the pickup and strewn food, clothes and other supplies bound for Haiti along
Florida's Turnpike in south Osceola County, six miles north of Yeehaw
Junction.

"I listen to a big boom, and everybody saying, `We're dying,'" said
Jean-Jacques, an Orlando resident who was helping his cousin and six other
Haitian-Americans truck supplies to Miami for shipment to their relatives in
Haiti.

After several terrifying minutes in the dark, and a second crash when
another 18-wheeler barreled into the scene, the Haitian-Americans walked
away from the crumpled wreckage with only minor injuries.

The semi driver involved in the first crash died at the scene, however.

Lt. Pat Santangelo of the Florida Highway Patrol's Turnpike Unit said the
accident occurred as a 1987 International rig came up behind the pickup
driven by Jean-Jacques and a U-Haul rental truck hauling the Haiti supplies.

Santangelo said the rig's driver, William J. Dana, 61, of North Miami Beach
apparently did not see the vehicles ahead of him.

After the initial impact, Dana's semi dragged the pickup and then careened
into the U-Haul driven by Jean-Jacques' cousin, Fritzner Alcime, 34, also of
Orlando.

"It was like a pancake," Santangelo said of the pickup's crushed bed.

The second impact lifted the U-Haul and turned it on its side, spilling out
dozens of 50-pound bags of rice, plastic drums of cooking oil, clothing and
shoes destined for families in Haiti.

After about five minutes, Jean-Jacques recalled, a second 18-wheeler hauling
lumber rammed Dana's overturned container and spun both vehicles. That
driver survived with minor injuries.

Eventually, Jean-Jacques said, one of his four passengers broke through the
cracked windshield and crawled to seek help from the drivers of a UPS truck
and a Honda who stopped at the scene. Those vehicles were also rammed during
the second collision, although the drivers were not hurt because they were
helping out at the first crash scene, Santangelo said.

Jean-Jacques, whose body was pushed against the steering wheel for about 15
minutes, had cuts and bruises.

Only a few hours earlier, the stucco finisher had volunteered to drive
Alcime's 1994 gold pickup truck after his neighbor asked him to accompany
him to Miami.

"When the police come to hospital, they say, `Mr. Lorange, you're lucky,'"
Jean-Jacques said Saturday evening at his home. "I say, `Thank God.'"

Santangelo said he better understood Haiti's plight when he saw how the
crash victims worked to save their relief supplies.

"Even the bags that broke, they were trying to salvage," Santangelo said.
"They were determined to get that food and supplies to their people in
Haiti."

The Orlando Sentinel is a Tribune Co. newspaper.
Copyright © 2004, South Florida Sun-Sentinel

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