By David Abel | Globe Staff | 11/14/2001
THE CRASH OF FLIGHT 587 / THE VICTIMS
SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic - Hurricanes have walloped this small, lush country; buses sometimes plunge off rickety mountain roads; and political conflict once regularly erupted in bloodshed, but Dulce Mateo has never seen a tragedy here of this magnitude before.
"Not in such an instant, without any warning, and with so many dead," said Mateo, who lost her 53-year-old sister-in-law, Virginia Mateo, and her 6-year-old nephew, Steven Lora, in the crash of American Airlines Flight 587 minutes after liftoff Monday morning from New York's John F. Kennedy Airport.
"This is a small island," said Mateo, the owner of a small jewelry shop outside the capital.
"Nearly everyone knows someone who was on that flight."
The Dominican Republic has not been immune to airplane crashes, but in the past, many of those who died in such crashes here were tourists.
American Airlines officials say 175 of the 256 passengers on board Flight 587 carried Dominican passports. Yet the vast majority of the others who died, officials here say, were Dominicans who moved to the United States and became US citizens.
"This is a grand tragedy without precedent for us - in human, social, economic, and political terms," said Luis Gonzales, spokesman for President Hipolito Mejia, who on Monday declared that the nation would observe three days of official mourning. "It is especially hard after Sept. 11."
Among the thousands who died in the terrorist attacks against the World Trade Center were 41 Dominicans. And one of those who survived the collapse of the Twin Towers, a 26-year-old Au Bon Pain clerk named Hilda Yolanda Mayor, died aboard Flight 587. Among the others whose lives were lost were Rafael Ravelo, a candidate for mayor in a town outside of the capital, and Cucu Balou, one of the nation's most famous meringue musicians.
The impact of Monday's tragedy, officials here say, is not confined to the families who lost loved ones.
Millions of dollars here have been lost since Sept. 11 as tourism dropped off by as much 10 percent nationally and by 30 percent at some of the nation's top resorts. Tourism from Europe, Canada, and the United States had started picking up again in the past few weeks, but in the past two days many travelers have canceled their plans. Officials here now believe that fear of flying may cut into the Dominican Republic's busiest tourist season: Thanksgiving week and the Christmas holidays.
Others are concerned about the financial health of an already reeling American Airlines, the largest US air service with regular flights to the Dominican Republic. Dominicans are concerned that if the airline decided to cut flights here as a cost-saving measure, they would feel isolated. On an island about 1,000 miles southeast of Miami, airplanes are the only practical way for most people to travel outside the country.
"We have many concerns now because this is without doubt the largest tragedy of modern times for this country," said Bernardo Vega, who served as Dominican ambassador to the United States until two years ago and is now editor of one of the country's largest newspapers, El Caribe. "We have now been double punched and we are hoping to be able to get back up. This one hit very close to home."
The last major air crash here occurred in 1996, when shortly after takeoff a Turkish charter flight fell into the ocean near the northern city of Puerto Plata, killing 189 mostly German passengers. In 1992, 34 passengers on a Cuban plane died on their way to Havana when their flight slammed into a mountain. The only previous large air crash occurred in 1970 when a Dominicana Airlines plane crashed on its way to Puerto Rico, killing 44 Dominicans.
Dulce Mateo has no interest in comparing tragedies. Like many of the victims' families here, she has been too busy fighting tears over the past two days.
The 45-year-old, who lives near the resort town of Boca Chica, has spent hours at Santo Domingo's Las Americas International Airport seeking information from American Airlines. She has been to a nearby hotel where American has brought in scores of psychologists and crisis managers from Miami and San Juan. And she is planning a visit to the US Embassy, where scores of Dominicans have provided DNA samples to identify family members and have sought visas to fly to New York.
For now, Mateo is just waiting for the bodies of her sister-in-law and nephew.
"Nobody should have to go through this," she said as she left a meeting with psychologists yesterday.
Initial Crash Story:
SHOCK AND UNCERTAINTY COEXIST WITH A YEARNING FOR MIRACLES
By David Abel
11/13/2001
SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic - By the time Cecilia Vega arrived in the cavernous terminal of the capital's Las Americas International Airport, there was little doubt about what had happened yesterday.
The crying and screaming and hugging had been going on here all day, as relatives of the victims on American Airlines Flight 587 trickled into the seaside airport.
It was nearly 9 p.m. when she finally made it here from her modest home in the southern province of San Cristobal, and she wasn't quite sure what to do. Her 40-year-old sister, Zeneida Vega, was on the flight. As she spoke, her eyes welled with tears.
"She has four children, four children," she said shaking her head. "It can't be."
No one survived the crash. American Airlines officials here said that about 90 percent of the passengers - or 221 people - were Dominicans.
But they wouldn't release a list of names last night and airline officials sent family members to a private room in the airport. Later, many of the family members were taken to a private hotel about 20 minutes away from the airport, where Dominican officials set up a bereavement center.
In a statement broadcast on TV, Dominican President Hipolito Mejia expressed his "deep sorrow."
The island's biggest baseball sports hero, Chicago Cubs slugger Sammy Sosa, was home yesterday and released a statement on Major League Baseball's Web site.
"My country is devastated," he said. "Today is my birthday - now I will associate tragedy with my birthday. So many Dominicans as well as Americans lost their lives today."
Dominicans here said they believed a group of popular merengue singers were on the flight and many said this was a double whammy, after many of their countrymen perished during the attacks on the World Trade Center.
"Why us?" said Danny Plata, a 54-year-old taxi driver who spent the day at the airport watching family members of those killed walk in and collapse in tears. "We have hurricanes and poverty. Do we need more?"
For Cecilia Vega, the day was a long, bumpy drive from her home, which she said had been spruced up with gifts from her sister. Zeneida had lived in Manhattan the past 12 years and frequently visited her family here.
She was the lifeline for Cecilia, sending her and her relatives hundreds of much-needed dollars every year. Now, as the holidays approach, Cecilia said she wasn't sure how the family would get by and how she would break the news to her children and her sister's children.
"Maybe there was a miracle," she said. "I believe in miracles."
David Abel can be reached at dabel@globe.com.
Copyright, The Boston Globe
