‘Like an earthquake’: Residents, workers go home in Santee 6 months after plane crash

Santi –

When residents and workers at Santi’s group home fled one afternoon last October, leaving half-eaten chicken salad sandwiches, still not knowing what had exploded in their area, their house shook like an earthquake, and fiery debris fell. around them.

Staff at Home of Guiding Hands allow their training in emergency situations. Two of the six residents—women with intellectual disabilities—were at home at the time, and their caregivers rushed them to the company’s truck, taking them to safety as quickly as possible.

Later, they learn what happened on the afternoon of October 11: a pilot flying from Yuma, Arizona, to Kearney Mesa crashed a small plane on Greencastle Street. The Cessna pilot and UPS delivery driver were killed, and two homes were destroyed, leaving a couple severely injured inside one of them.

Next to the two destroyed homes was a home belonging to Home of Guiding Hands, a non-profit organization that operates 31 group homes throughout the Eastern District that serve people with developmental and intellectual disabilities. The village and several other homes in the area suffered less serious damage.

Residents and staff at Home of Guiding Hands, a group home for women with intellectual disabilities, discuss their experience witnessing the Santee incident on October 11. Two of the six residents were having lunch that day when the plane crashed into a neighbour. Home, killing two.

While the collision affected most of the neighborhood’s residents and the families and friends of the dead and injured, it posed unique challenges to the women of the ‘House of Guiding Hands’. It came at a time when life has returned to normal after 18 months of strict COVID restrictions, once again disrupting the routine in which they thrive. And it was hard for some to understand, just as it was hard for some to understand the virus and its related systems.

Last Monday, six months after the day the avalanche was displaced, the home’s residents and staff returned to the Greencastle Street home for the first time. The hole in the roof where the hot plane wreckage burned was fixed. The living room furniture that was damaged by smoke and ash has been replaced. New landscaping replaced what had previously been blackened and destroyed.

Staff said the women seemed to be coping well with the comeback, but that emotional trauma lingered for some.

“A lot of people in my family don’t know I was (in) the third house (after the breakup),” Jill Berry, home manager at Home of Guiding Hands, said during an interview in February. “I was about to die.”

“The two houses next door were destroyed,” Amy Morrison, the home’s case manager, said earlier this year. “They were very lucky… had it been 20 feet closer, it would have been a completely different story.”

long-term shock

Cessna pilot, Sujata Das, died instantly in the accident, as did Steve Krueger, who was inside his truck when it collided. Neighbors rescued a couple in their 70s from a burning house. The newlyweds who lived at home were not at home.

Berry recalled a scene of chaos and confusion as she and the others evacuated the group home, with volatile metals burning in the air. Witnesses said that vehicles, tanks of gas and pyrotechnics exploded in the ensuing fires. Perry saw a boat burning in the garage of a house whose residents didn’t own a boat—it shook there when the plane went down.

Jill Berry, home manager of Home of Guiding Hands, paused during an interview Thursday, February 17 in El Cajon.

(Anna Ramirez/The San Diego Union-Tribune)

“(I) didn’t treat it until I got home, and it was about nine o’clock at night. And then it hit me–we lost to death,” said Berry.

In the aftermath of the incident and the rapid evacuation, Perry, Officer Theresa Boisfert and another employee moved the residents to another Guide Hands home, where they finished feeding the displaced residents and summoned their family members to let them know they were safe.

Then he began working on a plan to bring the six women into a nearby group home that was vacant. They proceeded to make the residents as comfortable as possible and to buy them new clothes, because all their possessions were left inside the damaged house.

Edward Hershey, the foundation’s chief executive, worked with fire officials to gain special access to the home to retrieve needed medications. He said some employees were afraid and some residents were worried about returning to the property.

Edward Hershey was the CEO of Home of Guiding Hands a few weeks ago when a plane crashed outside one of her homes last October.

(Anna Ramirez/The San Diego Union-Tribune)

“When they hear an airplane flying, they look at it over their shoulder,” Hershey said. “You can tell they have some PTSD from it.”

Issei, who has Down syndrome, was one of two residents who were at home when the plane crashed outside. She said earlier this year during an interview with Morrison that she was “terrified.”

“I can feel it now… shaking… it felt (like) an earthquake,” Issey said. “The fire came down. Lots of smokers. It was so disgusting. It was scary. Not good.”

Essie, 33, was having lunch on October 11 when a plane crashed outside her home on Greencastle Street in Santee.

(Anna Ramirez/The San Diego Union-Tribune)

Morrison works closely with residents of the Greencastle Street home and the other. She was not there on the day of the accident, but said Essie coped “well” with the consequences.

“But I know (the residents) are shocked,” she said. “Even my employees, when they talk about it, stay really, really emotional.”

But on the day of the accident, there was no time for any of that. Instead, Berry, Boisvert, and the others had to act quickly, calmly, and firmly.

“I like how focused I am.”

Home of Guiding Hands requires its staff to constantly train for emergencies – although a plane crash overseas wasn’t on its list of potential disasters. But it was close enough to other known hazards, such as a fire or earthquake, that staff training began.

“Every month, we do a firefighting exercise,” Berry said. “Every month, we take the ladies in and go out as if the house is on fire.”

This is what she and the others did when their surroundings caught fire that day.

“This training has kind of taken over in an emergency situation,” Hershey said. “They’ve practiced it enough that it didn’t become, ‘Hey, what do we do?'” “…They just knew what they had to do, they knew what the next steps were to follow and they followed through.”

Issei remembered the instructions she had been given that day: “Let’s go now.” And that’s what they did.

“I was focused,” Berry said. “I really admire myself for how focused I am. If I didn’t have this training, I don’t know what I would have done.”

“Where are we supposed to be?”

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, it upended the lives of both residents and employees of Home of Guiding Hands. Morrison and other staff members twice left their families for extended periods of quarantine with residents, some of whom had difficulty understanding coronavirus and related health precautions. For residents, their already small worlds are getting smaller, with their usual classes and programs cancelled.

“They weren’t allowed to go anywhere,” Morrison said. “For 18 months, they didn’t go out.”

But with vaccination rates soaring and case rates dropping late last year, life began to return to normal, and the leaders of the Guidance House gave the green light to resume small outings. The women of Greencastle Street in Boll Weevil celebrated, ordering a spicy iceberg burger, cheesy fries, and a vanilla milkshake.

But the collapse suddenly disrupted their lives again. And for another six months, the women—many of whom thrive on routine—had to adjust to everything new and different.

Residents and staff of the Guiding Hands home eat breakfast Thursday, February 17th, in the temporary home where they have lived for six months waiting for the Greencastle Street home to be ready for their return.

(Anna Ramirez/The San Diego Union-Tribune)

Finally, on April 11, they returned home. Boisvert said they had a party and food – this time pizza, cake and other kinds of dessert.

Staff noted that residents returned to their old routines almost immediately.

“On the first day, it was like they had never left,” Boisvert said. “We are where we are supposed to be.”

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