Brooklyn Diocese Called to Help Plane Crash Victims

By Tracy Early
Catholic News Service
(From the issue of 11/15/01)

NEW YORK -- The American Airlines jet that crashed on takeoff Nov. 12 fell into St. Francis de Sales Parish, a peninsula area in the Belle Harbor section of New York's borough of Queens.

Frank DeRosa, spokesman for the Diocese of Brooklyn, told Catholic News Service in a telephone interview Nov. 12 that the pastor of St. Francis de Sales was in the middle of a 9 a.m. Mass when a woman ran up the center aisle yelling, "Everybody get out."

Msgr. Martin T. Geraghty stopped the Mass, and the congregation of about 100 went outside to find black smoke billowing from the fires that destroyed several homes.

The plane, American Airlines flight 587, crashed shortly after taking off from John F. Kennedy International Airport for a flight to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, with one engine falling separately from the rest of the plane.

Because of the Veterans Day holiday, the St. Francis de Sales school was not in session. The school originally was to serve as a temporary morgue, but authorities later decided not to use it, DeRosa said. The school was to remain closed through the following day at least, and officials would determine later when it would reopen, he said.

At least 260 people were presumed dead from the crash. The plane had 251 passengers and nine crew members, none of whom were believed to have survived. Authorities said there also were at least six missing on the ground.

DeRosa said St. Francis de Sales Parish, made up heavily of Irish-Americans but other ethnic groups as well, was one of the most heavily affected by the World Trade Center attacks two months earlier.

The parish has held several funerals for firefighters and police officers lost at the trade center and for parishioners who had jobs in the twin towers, he said. "This is a community that has suffered greatly, and is now suffering again," he said. "The prayers of the diocese are offered for them."
DeRosa said Kevin Kearney, a member of the law firm that serves the Diocese of Brooklyn and serves as the principal lawyer of the diocese, was attending the Mass, and his son, Sean, was the altar server.

The telephone lines to the church were knocked out, but Kearney and his son told about the experience in a cell phone conversation, DeRosa said.

Bishop Thomas V. Daily of Brooklyn had celebrated two memorial Masses the previous day for families of those lost at the World Trade Center, and then went to Washington for the bishops' fall general meeting early on Nov. 12, DeRosa said.

After the crash, which occurred about 9:15 a.m., all three New York airports were shut down as part of a security alert that also included closing bridges and tunnels for a time. So Bishop Daily was not able to fly back immediately, but was planning to get an afternoon train, DeRosa said.

Cardinal Edward M. Egan of New York and Bishop William F. Murphy of Rockville Centre also left the bishops' meeting to return to their dioceses by train.

Father Robert J. Romano, who serves as a police chaplain as well as pastor of St. Bernadette Church in Brooklyn, was assisting at the crash site, DeRosa said. The diocese once again was facing the task of assisting families of victims.

When a TWA jetliner bound for France crashed shortly after takeoff from Kennedy in 1996, Father James T. Devine, chaplain for Our Lady of the Skies Chapel at the airport, spent days offering prayers and counseling to the victims' family members who were in shock.

Similar ministries were needed in 1999, when Egyptair flight 990 crashed after taking off from Kennedy on a flight to Cairo. Although many of the family members in that situation were Muslim, they welcomed the presence of a Catholic priest, he reported.

Copyright ©2001 Catholic News Service.  All rights reserved.