Grieving family members of the seven seniors who died in Saturday’s Sapelo Island dock collapse are demanding justice, calling the incident a preventable tragedy.
Regina Brinson recalls when the dock gave way beneath her, plunging her, her 79-year-old uncle, and others into the water. Isaiah Thomas reached for his niece’s hand and shirt, but she was unable to save him and barely managed to survive herself.
“I had to take his fingers, one-by-one, and peel them off of my shirt,” Brinson said during a Tuesday press conference. “And I pulled him back up to the top and saw his face. And I was like, `Oh my God, what did I do? What did I do?’ And he floated by me.”
Thomas was one of seven people who died Saturday when the dock gangway, which was built in 2021, collapsed under the weight of dozens waiting to board an afternoon ferry back to the mainland. He and his niece were helping Carlotta McIntosh, 93, cross the fractured gangway with her walker when the collapse occurred.
The tragedy occurred on a day when 700 visitors were on Sapelo Island for a fall festival celebrating its small Gullah-Geechee community of Black descendants of enslaved people. Those killed were all between the ages of 73 and 93. Other victims include Jacquelyn Carter, 75; William Johnson Jr., 73; his wife’s cousin, Queen Welch, 76; Charles L. Houston, 77; and Cynthia Gibbs, 74.
Grieving family members joined civil rights attorney Benjamin Crump on Tuesday to call on the U.S. Justice Department to investigate whether the gangway collapsed due to overcrowding. At the time of the incident, 40 people were on the gangway. Still, the Georgia Department of Natural Resources cites engineers who determined the 80-foot structure should have been able to support the weight of 320 individuals.
The dock was rebuilt in 2021 following a lawsuit settlement with Hogg Hummock residents who alleged that the ferries and docks did not comply with federal accessibility standards for individuals with disabilities. Sapelo Island is home to one of the South’s few remaining Gulla-Geechee communities descended from enslaved people.
Scholars believe the island’s isolation from the mainland has allowed the Gullah-Geechee people to preserve
much of their African heritage. The collapse comes amid new findings that suggest Gullah-Geechee areas might be at risk due to the climate crisis.RELATED CONTENT: Pharrell Sends Love To PETA Activist Who Interrupted His TIFF Film Premiere