From the screened-in porch of her rented cottage in Bayswater, N.S., Claire Mortimer can see the ocean. It’s a part of Nova Scotia she’s come to think of as home, although she’s never lived here.
From the nearby beach, she can almost see her father’s final resting place.
“This is the tombstone and the graveyard,” she says.
“He would have loved this place.”
READ MORE: The night 229 people lost their lives on Swissair Flight 111
John Mortimer and his wife Hilda were among the 229 people on-board Swissair Flight 111 when it crashed into the sea on Sept. 2, 1998.
Claire heard of the crash the next morning and within days she got on a plane from San Francisco to Halifax.
“I absolutely had to come here when it happened,” she says.
The American had never been to Nova Scotia before. Mortimer spoke to reporters at Peggy’s Cove in 1998, telling them she planned to return to thank those who supported the families of crash victims.
Get breaking National news
“I mostly want to really let the Canadian people know how tremendously, deeply, profoundly grateful we are for the outstanding work that you all are doing, and volunteering,” she said at the time. “I feel that it honours my father, it honours Hilda, and it honours all of us. And it reflects so much on the spirit of the Canadian people. I just am in awe of all of you.”
In the last 20 years, she’s come back at least once a year, and has forged deep friendships with locals.
“The experience of a whole province, a whole huge community of people sharing my grief, it just restored my faith in humanity,” she says now.
“It was more than just a plane crash. I don’t know how else to put it.”
Early on, Mortimer says she felt concerned for those involved in the aftermath of the crash – the people from all along the South Shore who responded to what they hoped was a rescue that night, and those who spent weeks scouring the waves and the shores for pieces of the wreckage and the people on-board.
“People here are suffering in a deep way because of their willingness to reach out and to do what needed to be done, and to protect us and to care for us,” she says.
READ MORE: Peggy’s Cove residents stepped up following Swissair crash
Mortimer says she’s heard stories of people who are still suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. From personal experience and her experience as a health-care professional, she knows the impact can be greater over time.
“Grief is healed with time, but PTSD can actually get worse with time,” she says.
“I really want to honour that tragedy as much as everyone here has honoured my tragedy.”
Mortimer has been involved in organizing the special memorial service for the anniversary of the crash this year.
She will spend Sept. 2 reflecting, as always, although this time she expects to be joined by many others. She will also be thinking of the Nova Scotians who responded to the call that terrible night 20 years ago.
But at 10:30 p.m. that night she’ll be alone, walking a quiet stretch of Bayswater Beach in the moonlight, where she’ll touch the cool water of the Atlantic Ocean. It’s her way of feeling close to the people she’s lost, in the place that embraced her in her time of need.
Comments