A Bee Hive resident expressed frustration at the response from the 913 number when she called for an ambulance moments after the smash-up on Monday evening on the public road.
Joan Williams lives a stone’s throw from where the truck GGG 6513 ended up in the trench after crashing into Mahaica mini-bus BJJ 1601. Williams told Stabroek News yesterday that she was watching the news when she heard a loud impact rending the stillness of the evening.
She said that she immediately thought it was an accident and upon looking out her window her suspicions were confirmed.
The woman said that she called her friend who is an ambulance driver but he told her that he could not “dispatch himself” but had to be given orders from the dispatcher’s office. He advised her to call 913. She said that when she dialled that number she was asked all sorts of questions and then told to call the LBI estate. At this point the woman’s credit on her cell phone was running out and she all but screamed at the operator for an ambulance that was desperately needed. Williams showed this reporter her cellular phone with the recorded dialled numbers. Efforts to get a comment from the Ambulance Dispatcher’s office at the GPHC proved futile.
“They telling me they got procedures……procedures when people dying,” Williams said passionately. “I understand people make hoax calls but they should know when is truth or not,” she said in her bid to explain that the operators should be trained to discern hoax calls from real emergencies.
She also said that there is a need for ambulances at police stations for situations such as these and for police officers to be medically trained and equipped to deal with injuries.
“Imagine is pitch black night and they come with no proper lighting……..no lights!”Williams lamented.
Animals on roadways
Williams also had her bit to say on the issue of cattle being on the road. According to her this is a nuisance that perpetually plagues the community. The cattle are most times left on their own with no one herding them, “and you can never seem to find owners for them,” she said.
Another resident expressed similar sentiments about the situation. He said that most times the cattle roam freely. The residents called for an enforcement of laws about animals on the roadways.
Meanwhile at the homes of Marisa Assaye, Desmond Datterdeen and Mohammed Akbar Mohammed who died in the smash-up, relatives are still immersed in shock and grief.
Assaye’s aunt Sandra Henry related to Stabroek News that the family last saw Assaye when she left for work on Monday morning. The woman said that Assaye goes to Early Childhood Classes every Monday and Wednesday and was returning from one of these when tragedy hit. She said that they were alerted to the accident by a phone call and almost the entire family left for the scene. When they arrived Assaye’s body had been already removed but they were not sure she had died. The family held on to hopes that she was alive, but the hopes were shattered upon arrival at the GPHC where Assaye’s sister, Tameka eventually identified her body.
Assaye’s grandmother overcome by grief just sat in a chair with a lost expression on her face; her grand-daughter had come to live with her from age three and had remained there ever since.
The father of Assaye’s four-month-old baby refused to leave his daughter’s side.
At the Datterdeen home relatives were quietly mourning while workmen were erecting a tent for a ‘wake’ to be held. Sheron Datterdeen, the wife of Desmond Datterdeen, haltingly related that she could not understand how her husband died like that.
She said that upon being alerted to the accident, she and her children who refused to stay at home took a taxi to the scene where she saw her husband’s lifeless and smashed body on the road.
The woman is left to raise her two daughters, one who has to write CXC in a few days, and a ten-year-old son. Her elder daughter Natasha also has nursing exams shortly. Breaking down in tears Sheron told Stabroek News that her husband was going to sell the mini-bus earlier this year but she had advised him not to.
Whole parapet
She also expressed her disbelief that the driver of the truck would swerve from a cow and hit a bus. “He left the whole parapet and serve onto the road,” the woman grieved.
Datterdeen’s sister-in-law told this newspaper that the man’s mother went to the scene of the accident yesterday morning to plant a flower at the spot where her son died. The woman Doreen Datterdeen shockingly found some of the remains of her son at the side of the road. She reportedly wrapped it up and took it to the hospital.
At the home of Mohammed Akbar Mohammed, his few relatives who are in Guyana gathered together. His niece Zabida Mohammed said that she last saw her uncle around 2 pm on Monday when she visited him at his workplace, Woodlands Hospital, after she had seen the doctor. Her sister-in-law called her to report the accident.
After going to the scene, they found out that Mohammed’s body had been transported to the hospital and her husband travelled to the city to identify the body.
The woman said that the way in which he died was so shocking to her and although Mohammed had no children of his own he did a good job looking after his great nieces and nephews.
When Stabroek News visited the hospital yesterday afternoon, relatives and friends converged to visit the survivors of the horrific crash. Jacquelyn Wood and Tamika Hermonstine, both of Hand-en-Veldt, Mahaica and Joey Sankar of Dundee, Mahaicony had all come to Georgetown together to conduct business. Sankar who returned to the hospital to visit Wood and Hermonstine said he was in the back seat of the bus and luckily escaped with only scratches and bruises. Hermonstine and Wood were not so lucky.
Hemonstine suffered lacerations to the head and fractured her neck. Wood was barely aware that her relatives were visiting. The woman’s entire neck was bandaged and her face was swollen.
Abiola Seraphin, a teacher at the Cane Grove Primary School, had attended the same classes as Assaye and other teachers who were involved in the accident. She said that she was in the front seat of the minibus and cannot recall seeing any cattle on the road although she remembers the truck approaching with its bright lights on.
Although Seraphin is thankful that she is alive she cannot help but grieve for her dead friend Assaye and kept asking about the welfare of the other teachers who were in the bus at the time.
In the meantime 34-year-old Julian Wilson remains in the High Dependency Unit (HDU) where he is slipping in and out of consciousness. He suffered serious head injuries.
While Datterdeen’s funeral is scheduled for Sunday the relatives of Assaye and Mohammed say that they will be buried sometime next week. All of the relatives of the deceased are calling on the relevant authorities to take serious action to enforce the laws pertaining to animals on roadways.
