April 12, 2003

Family Tragedy

(Edited to inform that all titles to this have been added long after the events that are described took place.)

Well, since my last post I have some very bad news.

Last night, at around 1:30 AM, I was watching a movie with some of my friends in my room. Shortly after it started, I received a phone call. At first, I thought it was one of Nathan's friends calling about playing Counter-Strike again. So, I told my friend to pick the phone up and set it back down and that I would pick it up if it rang again. It did, so I went and picked it up.

This next part has been playing through my mind repeatedly all day. My mom was on the other side in tears. At first, I didn't recognize her voice. After asking me whether or not I was alone, she told me that my sister had been in an accident concerning an explosion at an oil tank. My sister had been with her boyfriend at his grandfather's hunting lease along with some of her friends. They had arrived late enough that the grandfather wouldn't let them ride their four-wheelers, but he said that they could walk around. For one reason or another, they made their way to this oil tank thing (the details about this are a bit sketchy at the moment, I may explain this more in detail once I have the correct information. We don't know how at the moment, but the tank exploded.

Of the four that were there, my sister and her boyfriend were both killed. My cousin Mandy, who was also there, was severely injured. At the moment she is in the hospital showing no brain activity. The fourth person there not only survived, but only suffered a large bruise on his chest. Supposedly, he was running and jumped right when the explosion occurred. This made him fly farther or something. I am not sure of the details around this, but I thank God that someone survived the explosion.

Currently, my sister's body is in Dallas and we are waiting for the people there to determine what the exact cause of death was. Plans are being made for the funeral now, but we don't know when the funeral will be. I also don't know how long it will be before I return to LeTourneau. To be honest, I want to go back so that I can lose myself in my schoolwork and stop having to think about this right now.

Posted by Randy at April 12, 2003 03:49 PM