Relatives of those who died on ValuJet Flight 592 have been sitting, day after day this week, in the worst kind of penalty box.
Roped off behind a crimson cordon with a sign reading "Family Members," they came here to listen as the National Transportation Safety Board tried to determine whom to blame for the accident.For many, the hearing is a step in their quest for closure as they struggle with the gaping hole in their everyday lives while cradling memories of sons and daughters, husbands and wives, parents and grandparents.
One mother says she spends hours alone, sitting on the backyard swing that her son once used.
A minister, accustomed to counseling others about losing a loved one, is still overwhelmed after his son died in the May 11 ValuJet crash here.
And some say they will move and start new lives elsewhere in an attempt to break free from the tragedy that has boxed them in for the past six months.
Young and old, black and white, rich and poor, 110 people took the fatal flight on a sunny Saturday afternoon, and their seemingly random deaths haunt those who cared about them.
"I haven't been able to talk with anyone," said Carole Rietz, of Mount Juliet, Tenn., whose 21-year-old son died on the flight. "I can't even say his name," she said, grabbing a pen and notepad, and, with a shaky hand, writing "Howard."
"I just sit for hours and hours on the swing in the back yard, unable to talk with anyone. My son would not expect me to do this becase I taught him to look after others, to respect people," she said.
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"There is a moral and ethical responsiblity I feel that there should not be another mother standing here after me, feeling this," Rietz said.
Ray Lathem had been on a trip to Venezuela and boarded Flight 592 in Miami, headed for Atlanta, the last leg to his parents' house in Alpharetta, Ga.
"I've been a pastor for 25 years, and I never understood grief more than I do now," said his father, Warren Lathem.
"It was sort of a blur for a few days," Lathem said. "The memorial service was on Wednesday, and there were over 3,000 people there. I remember the event, but not what happened. I've dealt with all kinds of human predicaments, but I never understood how all-consuming it is. To read about it, or see it, does not communicate the depth of it."
Lathem said he knows the crash that killed his son was "the result of human error and a significant amount of greed. . . . These people died for no reason. I just vacillate between grief and anger."
A series of blunders by the discount airline and the maintenance company Sabretech led to dozens of full oxygen-generating canisters - without the necessary $1 safety caps - being placed in the cargo hold of Flight 592. Investigators believe one of the canisters discharged and that the resulting intense heat turned the DC-9 into a flying inferno.
"I just want to jump up and say `objection,' " Tiffany Walker, 18, said about the NTSB hearing.
She was listening to David Gentry, ValuJet's vice president of heavy maintenance, as he repeatedly failed to answer questions about who should have ordered the safety caps and who should have reviewed Sabretech's work.
"I used to defend ValuJet," Walker said. "I thought Sabretech killed my mother, but now I blame ValuJet."
Delmarie Walker, 38, had gone to Miami to look for work and was on that flight so she would be home to celebrate Mother's Day.