A night of fun and frolic turned into a nightmare for two households early Sunday morning.
Dead are Colin Dexter “Terry” Clarke, a 44-year-old worker of the Barbados Port Inc., of Chapman Street, St Michael, and 36-year-old gardener Jonah William, of Baird’s Road, Lower Carlton, St James.
The tragedy unfolded around 1 a.m. as Clarke gave William a ride to his St James home. The vehicle in which they were travelling was involved in a collision with a Transport Board bus along the St Stephen’s Hill/Black Rock Main Road junction in St Michael.
Three other passengers in the car were taken to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital for injuries and subsequently released. Of the 14 passengers in the bus, six were treated for their injuries at the scene and then chose further private treatment.
Sarah Bramble, Clarke’s mother, was devastated.
“I can’t take it. He spoke to me before he left and the next thing I know, someone telling me my son dead,” she said, adding she could not bring herself to go to the scene so another family member identified the body.
Survivor Leroy Clarke, cousin of the deceased, was the front seat passenger.
“All I remember was we were going to drop the guy [William] off. To be honest, I can’t say exactly what happened. All I hear is ‘bang’ and when I looked over, I saw my cousin slumped over,” he said.
At Baird’s Road, William’s girlfriend Alvina Ambrose was mourning the loss of the man she had shared her life with for the past seven years.
“He was a really nice, quiet man. We’re both from St Lucia but we met in Canada and went back home together. After I moved here, he used to spend six months with me and the other six in St Lucia,” she said.
Ambrose said she got the call around 1:30 a.m. and rushed to the scene.
“I always asked him why he had to go to town every weekend. We had our ups and downs but he was a good man. I will miss his laugh,” she said, as tears ran down her cheeks. (CA)
