Tears, prayers and words of support filled Old St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in Nome Friday, where people gathered for a vigil to honor the people who died in the crash of Bering Air flight 445 and to support their families.
The plane, carrying nine passengers and a pilot, crashed on its way from Unalakleet to Nome on Thursday afternoon. Following a search by several agencies and volunteers, the U.S. Coast Guard found the Cessna 208B Grand Caravan 34 miles southeast of Nome on Friday. Responders were working to recover the victims, who are all presumed dead, on Saturday.
Nome resident Terry Komonaseak came to the vigil to support friends whose families have ties to the passengers.
“My grandpa always said, Iñupiaq will help Iñupiaq, which makes a lot of sense. Human beings should help human beings,” Komonaseak said. “You never know basically when you're going to go – this incident has proven that. Hopefully, it's gotten people closer together.”
Nine religious leaders from local churches spoke to around 60 people in the pews. Each of them shared a prayer and encouraged residents to rely on their community and local counseling services to help process their grief. Around the region, people were gathering and organizing fundraisers as they began processing the tragedy and searched for ways to heal.
Nome City Clerk Dan Grimmer said that the response to the crash was reverberating across the Nome community, so they wanted to encourage people, regardless of their religious beliefs, to gather.
“It is very difficult to live in this great state without brushing shoulders with your neighbor, without getting to know people from other communities, without becoming friends with them, without becoming family with them. So how do we find comfort when we need comfort?” Grimmer said from the stage. “As we see that others are hurting or they have been traumatized, it is important for us to lend them our strength, to show them love, kindness, patience – all the virtue that we can so that they can lean upon us until they become strong again.”
The crash was not the only tragedy affecting people in the room and in the region. Religious leaders spoke about other recent deaths that residents might be still processing.
“Nome has had its amount of trauma, and this is just something piled up upon trauma which has been here before,” said one of the residents, Stan Burgess.
But a tragedy of this magnitude has not happened in the region in years, said Unalakleet resident and Norton Sound Health Corporation representative Tony Haugen.
“And even to have lost one is one too many,” he said.
Haugen was in Nome because his flight home was canceled. Bering Air suspended its operations after the crash but resumed flights Saturday.
Haugen, who is also a board member of the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium, was learning about victims he might have known.
“Two of our employees were among those who perished,” he said.
Haugen said that people have been coming together in communities across Western Alaska.
“When the region has something that occurs like this here, it doesn't only affect one community,” Haugen said. “We feel the pain region wide.”
Residents in several communities have started fundraisers for the families, like a cake walk in Unalakleet and an auction in Kotzebue. The owners of Kotzebue coffee shop Vibrant Brews said they would direct all Saturday proceeds to the families.
As Bering Air planes began landing again across the region, local residents showed their appreciation for the air carrier. In Savoonga, a group of people gathered at the airport Saturday to greet the incoming flight with Qagughmii's song in St. Lawrence Island Yupik.
Grimmer said that Bering Air’s crew is an integral part of western Alaska communities, with personal ties to residents.
“This is a small region. That pilot was a member of their family,” Grimmer said. “Our heart goes out to them, because I can only imagine what they're going through.”
Inside the church in Nome, the vigil ended with the crowd rising from their chairs to sing “Amazing Grace”. Then, Nome resident Nellie Weyiouanna spontaneously began the gospel song, "My Real Home”, as many among the audience joined in.
Correction: An earlier version of this story misidentified the flight number. It is 445 not 455.
