Four missions volunteers — three from Georgia and one from Arkansas — died in early February in car crashes while serving on missions trips.
Perry Goad, 45, and Richard Mason Jr., 58 — both members of Tabernacle Baptist Church, Cartersville, Ga. — as well as Martha Fuller, 66, a member of First United Methodist Church in Newnan, Ga., died Feb. 6. They were in a remote, mountainous area of Honduras when the truck they were riding in flipped over.
Roger Glenn Loyd, 47, an Arkansas Baptist disaster relief volunteer, died from injuries he sustained in a Feb. 3 automobile accident while returning home from aiding victims of a Missouri ice storm. He was a member of Calvary Baptist Church, Osceola, Ark.
The Honduras team of 28 people was traveling on a weeklong effort with Honduras Outreach Inc., a Georgia-based, nondenominational charity.
Along with the three who died, approximately 10 others were injured when the open-roof vehicle they were riding in rolled, authorities said.
Honduras Outreach has been sending North American volunteers to the Agalta Valley in Honduras for the past 18 years. The volunteers — approximately 1,110 each year — often spend time constructing roads, routing electricity and implementing running water in the remote villages there.
Also injured in the Arkansas accident were Richard Roberts, pastor of Yarbro Baptist Church, Blytheville, Ark., and Scottie Pardue, a member of Roberts’ church.
Loyd, Roberts and Pardue were all part of Arkansas’ Mississippi County Baptist Association’s disaster relief unit.
According to Bill Cantrell, disaster relief coordinator for the Arkansas Baptist State Convention, the accident occurred on U.S. Highway 63 near Ravenden, Ark., after Roberts, who was driving, lost control of the vehicle, causing the truck to flip at least twice.
Loyd was ejected from the vehicle and Roberts was pinned in the vehicle. Pardue exited the automobile on his own. (ABP, BP)
Share with others: