It was the Friday after the Good Friday/Easter Sunday long weekend. Lots of people were still out of town for the final days of spring break, so I wasn’t expecting much activity.
Then the email notification arrived: a serious collision involved a hockey team’s bus and a semi-trailer unit north of Tisdale. Word quickly spread that the Humboldt Broncos bus was involved. A short time later, it was confirmed there were fatalities. When you saw the crash site, you wondered if anyone could have survived. And you knew that after the accident, so many lives would be changed. The community of Humboldt would never be the same.
Sixteen people died, including 10 players, two coaches, the team’s trainer, their statistician, the radio play-by-play broadcaster and the bus driver. Thirteen more people were injured.
The 13 survivors suffered varying degrees of injuries; two played the entire 2018-19 season for the Broncos, and others have been able to resume their hockey careers elsewhere. Some won’t be able to play again because of the injuries they sustained.
But all of the survivors are going to have to live with the trauma associated with the crash, and the pain and the memories associated with it. The first responders who were called to the collision also have to live with what they saw.
The collision is a terrible tragedy, but it brought out the best in so many of us. Obviously there was tremendous support from the Saskatchewan and Canadian hockey communities.
But the support shown for the survivors transcended hockey. People who lived in other provinces and other countries who had never heard of Humboldt before, or who couldn’t locate it on a map, were eager to do what they could to help out the survivors and the families of the 29 people aboard the bus.
A GoFundMe campaign was set up within hours of the crash. It had a goal of $5,000; it raised more than $15 million. People lent their time and talents to show their support for the victims. A drawing of a winged Humboldt player by Bienfait artist Deanna Brown went viral.
Then there was the story of Logan Boulet, who became an organ donor just before the accident. Once people heard his story of how he wanted to save others - he saved the life of six people - they were inspired to sign up to be an organ donor as well. The people who were inspired by Boulet to become organ donors will save lives.
So many people placed a hockey stick on their patio as part of the "Sticks out for Humboldt." The Chicago Blackhawks and the Winnipeg Jets had Broncos on the name bars of their jerseys for their NHL game the following night.
One of the more memorable
These were fine young people on the bus, who had great opportunities ahead of them.
The two coaches who died, head coach and GM Darcy Haugan and assistant coach Mark Cross, played junior hockey in Estevan. Haugan later returned as a Bruins assistant coach, and eventually became the Bruins interim head coach and general manager.
I spent a lot of time working with Darcy Haugan when he was with the Bruins from December 2000-March 2003. We talked almost every week during the hockey season. His wife Christina worked in an administrative role at city hall when Haugan was with the Bruins, so I saw her regularly, too.
I think I talked to Darcy three times after they left Estevan in the spring of 2003. One of them was at the Weyburn Red Wings fall camp in 2008. I didn’t recognize him right away, but he definitely recognized me. We had a good chat about Estevan and his work with the Peace River junior B hockey team.
I was thrilled for Darcy when he was hired to be the Broncos head coach and general manager in 2015. He went into a very tough situation, and they missed the playoffs for the first time in decades. But he was building a strong team in Humboldt, and it showed in their results in 2017-18 before the collision.
I didn’t know Mark Cross as well. I talked to him on a handful of occasions during his three years as a player. But it speaks to his character that he won the Bruins’ Bill Shinske Ethics Award in his last two seasons with the Bruins; he’s the only player to win that honour twice in my 19 seasons watching the team.
I also remember that his parents drove from Strasbourg to Estevan for virtually every game, and made it to a lot of his road games, too.
While the night of the crash was an emotional time for me and for so many of us, and there have been lots of emotional times since then, the sorrow for most of us is nothing compared to the pain and sadness experienced by the survivors of the crash, the family and friends of the 29 people aboard the bus, and the people in the Humboldt area.
The one-year anniversary is going to be another emotional time for so many people. There have been constant reminders in recent days that the anniversary is approaching.
Those who have talked candidly and openly with the media and others deserve a lot of credit, because it can’t be easy.
Those who have decided to remain quiet should be respected, rather than pestered.
The collision is one of the saddest chapters in our province’s history. But as we have seen countless times, these tragedies can often bring out the best in us, and can bring us together.
