The mother opened her box of memories and the pain and darkness poured out again. An off-duty TWA pilot, Donald Gough of Mill Valley, Calif., and his wife, Ana, a TWA flight attendant, also were passengers. "The plane was going at 400 m.p.h., it suddenly changes direction, the fuselage is open so all this air and pressure is going into the cabin, and there's a sudden decompression.". All 230 passengers of TWA Flight 800 were recovered as fatalities. All 230 people on board the Boeing 747 were killed when the New York-to-Paris flight exploded and plunged into the Atlantic on July 17. * Gough, Analei Ralli, off-duty TWA flight attendant, of Mill Valley, Calif. (married to Donald Gough) * Torche, Melinda, 47, TWA Flight 800 crew, Mission Viejo, Calif. * Uzupis, Larissa, student from Montoursville, Pa. * Van Epps, Lois, mid-50s, English teacher at Edgemont Junior and Senior High School in Scarsdale, N.Y., of New York City Nothings ever the same, he said. Clicking on a highlighted name will take you to a short biography of that person. CAPTION: On a dock in Brooklyn, a section of the 747 jumbo jet that crashed Wednesday night is hauled away as part of the investigation into the cause. * Hull, James, 48, off-duty TWA employee, of Southampton, Pa. * Ingenhuett, Lonnie, 43, off-duty TWA employee, of Scottsdale, Ariz. * Jacquemot, Benoit, France * Meade, Sandra, 42, TWA Flight 800 crew, of Camano Island, Wash. * Nibert, Cheryl, student from Montoursville, Pa. The NTSB plans to stop use of the reconstruction July 7, 2021. * Beatty, Charles, 50, senior systems engineer with the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Dahlgren, Va.; of Spotsylvania, Va. From Coast Guard crews who became physically ill as waves tossed their search boat to doctors performing autopsies and X-rays in an atmosphere described by one as "a horror movie turned real," the toll of the Flight 800 disaster became increasingly vivid today on its behind-the-scenes players. At 8:02 p.m. on July 17, 1996, Trans World Airlines Flight 800 left from John F. Kennedy International Airport bound for Paris. * O'Hara, John, 39, executive producer at ABC Sports, of Irvington, N.Y. (husband of Janet O'Hara, father of Caitlin O'Hara) Silverman, Eugene, 54, a Bel-Air, Calif., tax attorney (married to Marietta Silverman, father of Candace and Jamie) Fragments of a third engine have also been sighted, but the divers and sophisticated sonar equipment have yet to detect the jet's fourth engine. "There's a process called onioning,' where you can keep covering up the levels of trauma one on top of the other," said Louis Gallagher, coordinator of Suffolk County's community mental health response team who has been working 20-hour days counseling victims' families. Yee, Judith, 53, former personnel executive with Bristol-Myers Corp., of New York City. * Alex, Christian, France Matthew was already mourning the loss of his father a year earlier to a heart attack. Forensic tests have not discovered traces of chemical substances that would indicate an explosive. * Silverman, Marietta (Etta) , 53 (married to Eugene Silverman, mother of Candace and Jamie) She was a reporter on a children's television show and an accomplished pianist. All rights reserved. TWA Flight 800 did not take off until around 8:30 p.m. Just after 5 p.m., Jill phoned her mother in Rutherford. * Kevorkian, Capt. On an otherwise recent sunny summer day, Carol Ziemkiewicz sat in the quiet of a kitchen of her spacious and gleaming townhouse in Point Pleasant Beach where she moved after retiring from teaching third grade for several decades at Rutherfords Pierrepont School. When Jill Ziemkiewicz stepped into the fuselage of the Boeing 747 at JFK on that July night 25 years ago, she wore the TWA uniform a blue, knee-length skirt, a white blouse, a blue scarf knotted around her neck like a cowgirl. Complete autopsy records, toxicology screening, and forensic analysis were reviewed. * Caillaud, Daniel, Deux Sevres, France Get the day's top news with our Today's Headlines newsletter, sent every weekday morning. I havent.. * Rio, Celine * Miller, Joan, Fairfield, Conn. * Anderson, Seana Michele. A picture of her daughter Jill sat on a nearby table a friendly smile with wide, inviting eyes. What caused it, we don't know.". * Simmons, Olivia, 50, schoolteacher and off-duty part-time TWA employee, Orange, N.J. * Loudenslager, Jody, Trout Run, Pa. A tireless volunteer for several New York nonprofit programs, she was also an active member of the Connelly Foundation, a family philanthropy that made grants to education, arts and social-service organizations. The National Transportation Safety Board report of the investigation was applied to correlate individual injuries with seat location and structural damage. 2023 Advance Local Media LLC. ""It doesn't happen in a town like Montoursville, you know?''. The TWA family was hit unusually hard by the crash. Remains of 15 victims were never found. * Brooks, Edwin, 81, former executive vice president of Taco Industries, of Edgartown, Mass. 1993 Feb;34(2):282-4. doi: 10.1097/00005373-199302000-00019. Tribune news services contributed to this report. The medical examiner has released the names of 32 victims who have been identified. * Ersoz, Clara Jean, 59, anesthesiologist, of Pittsburgh (married to Namik Ersoz, aunt of David Babb). "It's like a car smashing into a brick wall at 400 m.p.h.," said Suffolk County Medical Examiner Charles Wetli. Ziemkiewicz opened a photo album, pausing at a snapshot of her and Jill sitting on the lap of a Macys Santa Claus when mother and daughter spent a day in Manhattan. You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times. * Buttaroni, Mirko, 26, bank employee, of Fano, Italy (married to Monica Omiccioli). In an effort to test the mechanical failure scenario, NTSB investigators will examine the area around the tank, where fumes could have ignited and exploded during flight, according to officials. A private memorial service for the families of the victims of the 1996 TWA Flight 800 explosion is being held on Saturday, 25 years after the disaster that killed 230 They fell in love. * Gaetke, Stephanie, 33, owned landscaping business; of Kansas City, Mo. "It's a matter of sensitivity," she said. * Johnson, Eleanor, 50, retired vice president of editing firm, of Springfield, Va. (married to Leonard Johnson) In addition to the 18-member crew working the flight were 17 employees flying to Paris to meet another plane. He began his career as a protg of Andy Warhol's, honing his visual sense by working at Warhol's famed Factory studio and going antiquing with the father of pop art. But TWA Flight 800 on July 17, 1996 was to be her coming-out party of sorts her first international flight. Family members left the following morning by bus to New York. * Krukar, Andrew, 40, an engineer at the Torrington Co. in Watertown, Conn., of Bridgewater, Conn. JED JOHNSON, 47, WAS FAST BECOMING one of the most acclaimed interior designers in the country. Benjamin, Arthur, high school computer science teacher, of Philadelphia. The purpose of the present study, which represents the first analysis of aviation injuries incurred during a midflight incident, was to examine the injuries sustained by the victims of the TWA Flight 800 disaster and to determine any correlation of injuries with structural damage and seat location. It's an open wound that never seems to heal for Jez, even 25 years later. We did everything together, Carin said. But he chose another trip to Honduras as part of a science project. Five years later, Judge would perish in the 9/11 terrorist attackas he ministered to firefighters and police at New York Citys World Trade Centers twin towers. ", Later in the day, a second dentist emerged from the medical examiner's office and talked with composure about having helped identify his colleague. (married to Edwin Brooks) Not only was TWA 800 one of the worst air disasters in U.S. history, it also raised questions about how America responds to conspiracies, how our government monitors the maintenance of aging commercial jetliners and how we treat relatives of victims. The TWA flight attendants met 21 years ago when they were working a Paris-to-New York flight together, and they had flown as a team ever since. National Library of Medicine A soft-spoken man in a world dominated by hyperbole and high tension, he took the dismissal in typically level-headed style. (married to Ruth Brooks) From ancient times, history has been pockmarked withsudden, unexpected tragedy that rips apart the lives of ordinary people. 26 years after Flight 800 crash, victims' friends, family still gather TWA Flight 800 crashed in the Atlantic Ocean near East Moriches on July 17, 1996. Some 180 miles from Rutherford, in Montoursville, Pennsylvania, Stephanie Bedison bears similar emotional scars as the Ziemkiewicz family. But he said the pattern of injuries he has seen -- which reflects examinations of less than one-fourth of those on the plane -- would not be consistent with a bomb, plastic or otherwise, in the passenger cabin. Murta, Angela. 2000 May;48(5):987-8. doi: 10.1097/00005373-200005000-00035. In Moriches, New York, Matthew Cashman also feels that need to remember the history of TWA Flight 800. For Bedison said many Montoursville residents retreated into their own emotional privacy while also trying to make time to attend the funerals. * Chemtob, Monique, Los Angeles FOIA The * Maresq, Nicolas, France Customers have virtually disappeared from Larry's Crab House, a festive restaurant with a deck and volleyball court adjacent to a marina on Moriches Bay. So did conspiracy theorists and ordinary people who just wanted to offer some measure of comfort. TWA Flight 800, a Boeing 747, bound for Paris, France with 230 people aboard, crashed July 17, 1996, minutes after takeoff from John F. Kennedy International Nelson, Twyla, New York * Braman-Mosberg, Rosemary, 47, off-duty TWA employee, of Hoboken, N.J. The 54-page transcript released Monday during the opening of federal hearings into the July 17, 1996, disaster was described by investigators as routine conversation, revealing nothing unusual leading up to the blast aboard the Paris-bound flight that killed all 230 people aboard. Sign up now for Good Morning, Pennsylvania, and get the most important headlines delivered free to your inbox by 6 a.m. Monday-Friday. National Transportation Safety Board Vice Chairman Robert Francis said his investigators will first rebuild the portion of the plane--a 25-foot-by-40 foot area--that stretches from the front cargo bay to just beyond the right wing. The tragedy came just two days before the opening of the XXVI Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta, Georgia, and many suspected terrorism. Price, Dennis, investment manager, of Englewood, Colo. (married to Peggy Price) Skip Pulcrano, a retired cheerleading coach from New Jersey, helps Sharon Goss place a flower in the ground in the memorial park in Montoursville for the victims of TWA Flight 800. You get better. She was overseeing the renovation of her Manhattan home, but her children were vacationing at the family's summer place in Hericy, France. I just could not comprehend the shock. Victim fragmentation patterns and seat location supplements crash data: American Airlines flight 587. Unnamed passenger flying with Elsie Ostachiewicz, * Paquet, Huguette, France Only no one was alive. * Miller, Amy, 29, hardware store comptroller, of Andreas, Pa. (married to Kyle Miller) * Teang, Rachama-Chan, France * Gray, Charles H. III, 47, president and chief operating officer of Midland Financial Group, Inc., of Little Rock, Ark. He attracted an unusually eclectic, though uniformly wealthy, clientele, including Richard Gere, Mick Jagger and Yves Saint Laurent. * Romagna, Barbara, 76, of Sun City Center, Fla. (married to Jay Anderson) * Berthe, Maurice, Belleville, France * Baszczewski, Daniel, student from Montoursville, Pa. But theres a big hole in the family.. Students, parents, teachers, clergymen -- there are only 5,000 people in this northern Pennsylvania hamlet, so it wasn't long before everyone knew that among the dead on Flight 800 were 16 students from the school's French Club and five adult chaperones. The National Transportation Safety Board determined the cause of the explosion was likely a short circuit that ignited fuel vapors as the pilots were shifting fuel to better balance the airplane. * Griffith, Donna, Westhampton, N.Y. The investigation of the crash of TWA Flight 800 is a seminal moment in aviation safety history, said NTSB Managing Director Sharon Bryson. * Hazelton, Sandra, of Beachwood, Ohio, a high school French teacher taking her daughter to Paris as a college graduation gift. This is a history lesson. * D'Huimieres, Dominiques, LePlessis, France The NTSB He also decided to sue Lychner, 37, for the emotional trauma the case had caused him. Keep supporting great journalism by turning off your ad blocker. * Krikhan, Margot, 51, a bookkeeper at the Montessori School in Washington, Conn., of Brookfield, Conn. 8600 Rockville Pike * Cremades, Daniel, France, * Dadi, Marcel, 46, French musician who helped spread Chet Atkins' style of guitar-playing across Europe and was returning home after being honored at Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, Tenn. The plane had exploded 12 minutes after takeoff at JFK International Airport. Each one of these kids was unique, she said. JACQUES AND CONSTANCE CHARBONNIER fell in love on an airplane. He says his daughter wanted to go on the trip but because of a planned family vacation, he wouldn't allow it. * Dwyer, Larkyn, 11, of New River, Ariz., was en route alone to visit relatives in Paris, * Edwards, Daryl, 41, off-duty TWA service supervisor, Jersey City, N.J. Weaver, Monica, student from Montoursville, Pa. It turned out that TWA 800 fell because sparks from a defective wire ignited vapors in a fuel tank, which then exploded. * Grivet, Cyril, senior lab technician at Carnegie Institution lab at Stanford University, Stanford, Calif. That investigation also led to the equally important development of our Transportation Disaster Assistance division and the legislation in place today governing carrier responsibilities for family assistance in the wake of a transportation disaster, said Bryson. * Gaetke, Dan, 33, owned landscaping business and taught elementary school art; of Kansas City, Mo. But our modern world, with television and social media, have brought those intimate moments of tragedy into our living rooms and to the cellular phones we carry in our pockets. He, like hundreds of families around the world, are now beginning the struggle to carry on. An accomplished high school swimmer, her close friends called her "Jilly Fish.". * Haurani, Dr. Ghassan, of Grosse Pointe Shores, Mich. (married to Nina Haurani) So, they're focusing on it.". He said some of them are afraid that debris or body parts will wash up. The Charbonniers were only two of several veteran TWA employees on board Flight 800. FBI officials have said that the bodies of passengers seated in the front of the plane suffered more damage than those people riding in the rear of the aircraft. Almost everyone knew one of the students.. You move on. Chrysou K, Halat G, Hoksch B, Schmid RA, Kocher GJ. * Merieux, Rudolphe, son of the president of the pharmaceutical company Merieux Laboratories in Lyons, France (his father was not on the plane) TWA Flight 800, a Boeing 747, bound for Paris, France with 230 people aboard, crashed July 17, 1996, minutes after takeoff from John F. Kennedy International Airport. "You would see ripping, shredding and tearing of bodies" from a bomb in the cabin, he said. He skated as an undergraduate at Harvard, taking some time off to play professionally in the North American minor leagues. * Scott, Michael, 44, physicist, of Stevenson, Ala. (married to Barbara Scott) Daniel Baszczewski, 17, had nothing but A's on his report cards from first grade forward. Methods: Once victims are identified, investigators will plot them and their detailed injuries atop a seating chart of Flight 800 provided by TWA to determine if the pattern of injuries explains the nature of the explosion that caused the crash. * Kwiat, Kimberly, 26, of Briarcliff Manor, N.Y. (sister of Patricia Kwiat) The rest have been withheld pending notification of family members. Mike Kelly is an award-winning columnist for NorthJersey.com. * Luevano, Jr., Elias, 42, off-duty TWA employee, of Albuquerque, N.M. Johnson, Leonard, 53, mechanical engineer, of Springfield, Va. (married to Eleanor Johnson) * Lychner, Pamela, 37, prominent Texas crime victims rights advocate, of Houston (mother of Shannon and Katie Lychner). That determination still has not been made, and it's possible it never will be. * Grimm, Julia, student from Montoursville, Pa. * LaForge, Alain, Hermelinghen, France But Wetli added: "We see Quincy' on TV, and he identifies people very quickly. * Paquet, Ingrid, France Constance Coiner, 48, an English professor specializing in women's literature, was awarded tenure last year at the State University of New York, Binghamton, and also won the school's award for excellence in teaching. We were born to be best friends.. Steven, 57, TWA Flight 800 pilot, Stratford, Conn. Story, William R. , president and chief executive officer of National American Insurance Co. of California. Twenty-three years ago, the borough of Montoursville in Lycoming County suffered an unimaginable loss. * Lacailledesse, Antoine, France She pulled out a card. Lessons from a large trauma center: impact of blunt chest trauma in polytrauma patients-still a relevant problem. * Coiner, Constance, 48, associate professor of English and literature at State University of New York at Binghamton, of Binghamton, N.Y. (mother of He also said some of the victims were found to have carbon pigments or water in their lungs. Also scattered in the surf or deep below were the bodies of the 230 victims. On those days, when she peruses the boxes with photographs and letters and poems about her daughter, Ziemkiewicz is reminded once again of what might have been. Below is a list of those on board, according to family, The community gathered at the school to mourn. It was one of many moments since the crash of TWA Flight 800 when personal feelings intruded on the practiced professionalism of disaster workers. For several years she worked in the impressionist-art department at Sotheby's, the renowned auction house. They ask whether they smoked, since teeth would reflect tobacco stains, and whether they had moles and where. WebHAUPPAUGE, New York (CNN) -- The Suffolk County medical examiner has released the first autopsy report on the victims from TWA Flight 800. * Wolters, Bonnie, 44, of New York City, a bond trader engaged to be married to a judge who was not on the flight but had planned to join her in France next week. Until now, the autopsy reports have been withheld pending an official determination of what caused the explosion. Joseph A. Kirby and Tribune Staff Writer. The names of 210 victims identified from TWA Flight 800: Aikens-Bellamy, Sandra, New York Aikey, Jessica, Montoursville, Pa. Alex, Christian, France Allen, Otis Lamar, Marietta, Ga. Amlund, Svein, Norway Anderson, Jule, Warson Woods, Mo. * McPherson, Pamela Cobb, 45, off-duty TWA employee, of New York City It was hard to accept, said Bedison, now retired from her job as a special education teacher and track and cross-country coach at Montoursville Area High School. * Callas, Dan J. , 22, TWA Flight 800 crew, of Philadelphia Her Daughter Larissa Uzupis was one of the 21 people from Montoursville High School and one of the 230 people who boarded Trans World Airlines Flight 800 and didn't make it home. Careers. He was traveling to France to finish work on a new line of fabric, which he planned to sell in a forthcoming string of his own boutiques in New York, Paris and London. * Miller, Kyle, 29, hardware store co-owner, of Andreas, Pa. (married to Amy Miller; their trip was to celebrate fifth wedding anniversary) Two Coast Guard crew members who spent two days and nights pulling bodies from the ocean were so traumatized by what they had seen and touched that they were in serious emotional distress, according to local watermen who know them. What followed was unbelievable grief and anguish. TWA Flight 800 did not take off until around 8:30 p.m. Just after 5 p.m., Jill phoned her mother in Rutherford. * Harris, Lawrence, New York Medical Examiner Wetli said only half of the 100 bodies retrieved from the ocean so far had been processed, meaning photographed, fingerprinted, weighed, X-rayed, and autopsied. Time doesnt heal the wounds. Donald, off-duty TWA pilot, of Mill Valley, Calif., and Incline Village, Nev. (married to Analei Gough) Injuries were assessed by anatomic region and severity by using the Abbreviated Injury Scale. (married Snyder, Capt. * Coiner, Ana Duarte, 12, of Binghamton, N.Y. (Constance Coiner's daughter) The trip to France was a reward to herself for a wonderful year, one that included the finishing of her second book. Lychner's husband, Joe, had planned to join the family later. Profiles M - Z. But on the day before the crash, he joined the growing list of employees laid off by ABC as it prepares to merge with Disney. He says he knew nearly all the students on board the flight. To some it is still a story of a terrorist conspiracy that persists despite well-documented facts showing the plane was actually brought down by a tragic mechanical failure. But memorial gardens, while comforting, cant erase the scars of losing a daughter. Harkness, Eric, 23, off-duty TWA employee, of Columbus, Ohio. After receiving his Harvard degree in biological anthropology last month, he was returning to France on Flight 800 to train with the French national team. WebAnalysis of victims' autopsies revealed that as many as 47 of the 230 people on board the 747 may not have been killed instantly by the explosion that felled the plane. Analysis revealed that the severity of injury and anatomic injury pattern did not generally correlate with seating position or structural damage. Wolfson's mother, Eleanor, was one of the chaperones. He said most have massive injuries, adding that it would be "irresponsible and inhumane" to allow families to see the victims, or even to see photographs of their bodies. * Greene, Renee, North Woodmere, N.Y. In her Point Pleasant Beach home, Carol Ziemkiewicz says she draws comfort from a garden in Lyndhurst that was built in Jills memory. Traveling to France to study gardens with wife. Dozens of people visited the memorial room to remember and reflect- including Maynard Bogard. A comparison was performed against injury data from takeoff and landing incidents. The reports are being sought by the families for legal purposes. * Watson, Jacqueline, student from Montoursville, Pa. *Bluestone, Nicolas, Pound Ridge, N.Y. People should know that.. After an exhaustive, four-year-long investigation, the NTSB determined the probable cause of the crash was an explosion in the center wing fuel tank. Carven, Jay, 9, of Bel Air, Md. Investigators say the plane broke up at 13,700 feet, then burst into flames at 9,000 feet, falling into the Atlantic just east of Long Island. * Shorter, Anna Maria, of Los Angeles, wife of saxophone player Wayne Shorter who was not on the flight (aunt of Dalila Lucien) Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information, Texas congressman who broke with GOP is censured, Hong Kong court convicts activists behind Tiananmen vigil, Election conspiracies fuel dispute over voter fraud system, Arizona governor wont proceed with execution set by court, Desperate mountain residents trapped by snow beg for help; We are coming, sheriff says, Look up: The 32 most spectacular ceilings in Los Angeles, Winter storms ease drought conditions in California, report shows, 19 cafes that make L.A. a world-class coffee destination, David Lindley, guitarist best known for work with Jackson Browne, dies at 78, Best coffee city in the world? 2017 Apr 20;25(1):42. doi: 10.1186/s13049-017-0384-y. * Foulon, Didier, France * Kwiat, Patricia, 21, student at Notre Dame University, of Briarcliff, N.Y. (sister of Kimberly Kwiat), * Labys, Jane, 51, a real estate agent from Morgantown, W.Va. * Griffith, Joanne, 39, off-duty TWA employee, of Brooklyn, N.Y. The memorial, which also includes gardens, has flags from the 13 countries of the victims, a curved black granite memorial with the names of the victims engraved on one side and a wave releasing 230 seagulls on the other. * Wolfson, Wendy, student from Montoursville, Pa. (daughter of Eleanor Wolfson) ""She just commanded respect from elected officials and from the criminal-justice system,'' says Andrew Kahan, director of Houston's Crime Victims Office.