The Tribune

By JADE RUSSELL

Tribune Staff Reporter

jrussell@tribunemedia.net

NICHOLAS Oliver Sr handed over $120 so his 16-year-old son could make the short flight to Andros and experience the regatta for the first time.

Hours later, the grieving father stood near the smouldering wreckage of the Flamingo Air aircraft and watched the bush burn around the place where his son died.

“I give him my $120 to kill my son,” Mr Oliver cried.

Nicholas Oliver Jr, a CV Bethel Senior High School student remembered as quiet, kind, mannerly and a gifted drummer, was among the ten people killed when the aircraft crashed near San Andros Airport on Independence Day.

He had been eager to spend the full regatta weekend in Andros, where he was supposed to reunite with his mother, sister and other relatives.

His father, a mechanic originally from Andros, had planned to travel by boat the following day and meet him there.

He never got the chance.

“Right now, I can’t explain how much pain I’m in,” Mr Oliver said.

Nicholas lived in New Providence with his mother, who relocated from Abaco after Hurricane Dorian.

Mr Oliver’s work takes him throughout the Family Islands, but he said he spent as much time as possible with his son whenever he was in New Providence.

Nicholas had initially been expected to travel with his father by boat. However, the teenager wanted to leave on Friday so he would not miss part of the regatta weekend.

“I only was trying to make sure my son was happy,” Mr Oliver said.

He explained that he chose not to fly because transportation would have been limited once they reached Andros, but paid for his son to make the brief journey by air.

Mr Oliver said he handed the fare to a man at Flamingo Air who appeared to be dressed as a pilot. He was unsure of the man’s identity but believed he was also among those who died.

Through tears, he struggled with the thought that the money he paid to send Nicholas safely to Andros instead placed his son aboard the doomed aircraft.

“Fifteen-minute flight, 10-minute flight,” he said. “In the space of couple minutes you gone and take my money and gone kill my son, bro. Kill my baby.”

Mr Oliver also questioned why Nicholas’ name did not initially appear on the passenger manifest, saying he had watched a Flamingo Air employee write it on a list.

He said the confusion compounded the agony as relatives tried to determine who had been aboard.

Nicholas was travelling ahead of his father to meet his mother, sister and extended family in Andros. The trip was supposed to give him his first full taste of the island’s regatta celebrations.

Instead, his father was left confronting images he cannot escape.

“I can’t sleep,” Mr Oliver said, weeping. “I seeing all the bush on fire in my flashes.”

He said he does not normally drink alcohol but had considered doing so because he could not quiet his mind long enough to rest.

“I got to try drink rum, get something to drink or something like that,” he said.

The memories return whenever he closes his eyes.

“I was there, I see him burn,” he said tearfully. “They burn him up.”