‘That fight to survive’: Dock tragedy is latest chapter in Gullah Geechee community’s long struggle
CNN
For Michael and Kimberly Wood’s two young daughters it was their first visit to the annual festival celebrating the culture of the Gullah Geechee community on Georgia’s Sapelo Island, the birthplace of their maternal grandmother and descendants of enslaved Africans.
For the young daughters of Michael and Kimberly Wood, it was their first time at the annual festival celebrating the culture of the Gullah Geechee community on Georgia’s remote Sapelo Island, the birthplace of their maternal grandmother and other descendants of enslaved Africans. After a day of storytelling, poetry, religious dance and hope-filled spirituals a week ago Saturday, the Woods, other family members and dozens of festival goers waited on a floating dock and adjoining gangway for the scenic ferry ride to the mainland across marshy Doboy Sound. A loud cracking sound and a sudden shifting of the gangway were the only warning before the relatively new dockside aluminum walkway plunged into the water about 60 miles south of Savannah. The collapse killed seven people, injured several others and gave his two girls what Michael Wood said was their first glimpse of the Gullah Geechee community’s longtime heartache and resilience. “It’s that fight to survive,” said Wood, a quality assurance engineer who slid down the collapsed gangway, snatched his 74-year-old mother out of the water and handed her to a stranger on the dock. Wood said he unsuccessfully attempted to reach his 8-year-old daughter Hailey, who was eventually rescued by the boyfriend of a relative as she clung to part of the dock. His wife Kimberly, clinging to their 2-year-old daughter Riley and using a book bag as a flotation device, drifted away in the strong current before another stranger pulled them safely to shore. The October 19 tragedy is the latest chapter in the struggles of one of the last surviving Gullah Geechee communities in the Georgia Sea Islands. These descendants of Africans who were enslaved on coastal plantations in the Southeast have fought to preserve their ways of life amid what they describe as a long-standing policy of neglect by state and county officials.
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