Allagash accident survivor carries tragedy’s burden

One year ago this morning, Edilberto Morales-Luis escaped death through the back window of a van that had flipped off John’s Bridge and landed on its roof in the Allagash Wilderness Waterway.

Fourteen relatives or friends who were with Morales-Luis in the van drowned around 8 a.m. on Sept. 12, 2002, in what’s been called the worst fatal traffic accident in Maine’s history.

Being the one left behind carries a burden of responsibility that is unfamiliar to the now 25-year-old Guatemalan. Morales-Luis not only was the accident’s lone survivor, but he also was the sole witness to the tragedy.

In the days after the accident, Morales-Luis was sought by the Maine State Police and U.S. Department of Labor officials to provide details not just of the accident but about working conditions overseen by his employer, the now-defunct Evergreen Forestry Services of Sandpoint, Idaho. Morales-Luis helped the state police to identify some of his friends’ bodies and their belongings.

“He was very nice, very strong,” said Juan Perez-Febles, the state’s monitor advocate for migrant and foreign workers who served as Morales-Luis’ interpreter. “I admire him. I’d like to meet with him again and give him a hug and talk about what happened.” But that’s not likely to happen just yet, because Morales-Luis has a lawyer who won’t let him talk to anyone for the time being – not the police, not the media, not well-meaning friends from Maine because of pending litigation. Attorney Jack Scarola’s Florida-based law firm, which handles legal issues on behalf of foreign and migrant workers, is helping Morales-Luis pursue workers’ compensation payments that a year later still haven’t been authorized.

Workers’ compensation

Since two weeks after the accident, most of the victims’ families have had weekly checks of up to $300 deposited into Florida bank accounts set up for them for free by Scarola’s law firm. The money is transferred from those Florida accounts to bank accounts in Honduras and Guatemala. The payments, called “lost time benefits,” will be paid for 500 weeks, or longer if a dependent’s child is not 18 years old before the 500 weeks has passed.

Other than Morales-Luis, two families have not received workers’ compensation benefits because of disputes over how much should be paid or who in the family should receive the money.

One woman lost both her husband and her son in the accident and is fighting to receive benefits on behalf of both men, Scarola said. Two relatives of another accident victim are both claiming the man’s benefits. All of the disputes are awaiting hearings before a Maine Workers’ Compensation Board examiner. No dates have been set and the issues could be settled before hearings are held.

Liberty Mutual, the workers’ comp insurance company for Evergreen Forestry Services, is disputing Morales-Luis’ eligibility for benefits and questioning whether he was physically or psychologically injured during the accident, a spokesman told the Bangor Daily News earlier this year. The insurer said Morales-Luis refused medical treatment and would not go to a hospital in the hours after the accident. Though he was eventually convinced to go to the hospital by his supervisor, Keith Hansen, the insurer said they have received no records of any injuries. “With respect to the survivor of this tragedy, we have yet to receive any information regarding a disabling injury that would qualify him to receive benefits under Maine’s workers’ compensation law,” said Liberty Mutual spokesman John Cusolito last December.

This week, Cusolito declined to comment on the workers’ compensation case.

“Out of respect for [Morales-Luis’] privacy, it would be inappropriate for us to comment on his medical condition or his claim,” Cusolito said.

According to attorney Scarola, Morales-Luis was injured in the accident. A Maine doctor who traveled to Guatemala has evaluated the survivor, he said. Scarola and Portland attorney John Sedgewick, who is handling the workers’ compensation claim before the state board, hired the doctor.

Scarola said Morales-Luis experiences physical or “orthopedic pain” from injuries he suffered in the accident. The Florida attorney declined to list the injuries or name the doctor. “I can tell you generally that he has significant physical complaints,” Scarola said. “He does not possess the skills to do anything other than physical work and it’s difficult to do physical work when you’ve got physical pain.”

Ten days after the accident, Morales-Luis boarded a plane at Bangor International Airport to return to Guatemala. His supervisor’s wife, Mary Hansen, who was there to send him off, gave him $1,400 on behalf of Evergreen to replace the exact same amount he lost in the accident.

In December, Morales-Luis received $6,850 from the Migrant Relief Fund set up in Caribou by friends and supporters after the accident.

While families of the victims receive workers’ compensation checks, Morales-Luis is working small jobs in Guatemala that require little physical exertion to earn money, Scarola said. His family also is given food from neighbors and friends.

Van accident

How Morales-Luis got out of the van that day is unclear. According to Maine State Police, the then 24-year-old Guatemalan was wearing a seat belt while he was sitting in the center of a bench seat in the back of the 15-passenger van. Morales-Luis may have been blown out the window or he may have pushed it open and crawled through, police said.

Morales-Luis bobbed up and down in the 15-foot-deep water before he could swim to a nearby shore. He stood on John’s Bridge crying for help when a logging truck came upon the scene about a half-hour after the accident occurred. The driver called for help and the two men waited for emergency personnel. From the bridge, Morales-Luis could only stare into the water. According to state police, the cause of the accident was “imprudent speed.”

A memorial service for the 14 foreign workers who died will be conducted at 2 p.m. today at John’s Bridge, which spans the channel between Eagle and Churchill lakes on the Allagash Wilderness Waterway. Friends and relatives are meeting at 11 a.m. at One Stop in Ashland to form caravans and carpool over the logging roads to the bridge.