In memoriam: Va. airmen killed nine years ago remembered

Today marks the ninth anniversary of an airplane crash that killed 18 National Guardsmen from Virginia Beach. To commemorate their loss, PilotOnline.com is featuring profiles of the airmen who died. This story was originally published in The Virginian-Pilot on March 5, 2001.

National Guardsmen remembered - They were fathers, friends, soldiers

The airmen of the 203rd Red Horse Squadron are part-time National Guardsmen.

They hold civilian jobs. When they leave on a mission, it's usually for days or weeks, not months. Some members have lived in the same houses for years.

The threads of their lives intersect with others all over Hampton Roads, braiding with those of wives and children, girlfriends and buddies, neighbors and colleagues. Those threads weave them tight into the community.

Now 18 of them are dead. Thirty-five children are fatherless. Eight women are widows. Dozens have lost sons, brothers, friends, co-workers. Saturday's air crash in a Georgia cotton field was the worst loss for the Virginia National Guard since the Normandy invasion.

Pain, like the threads of their lives, has spread far.

The hole they leave behind in this place is a jagged one.

Master Sgt. James Beninati, 46

The balloons were hung, the cake baked. All Jim Beninati's wife and four children needed Saturday was a telephone call from Camp Pendleton. It never came.

Beninati never tasted the white icing and sprinkles on the cake his 12-year-old daughter, Amy, baked especially for him. He never saw the handmade card from his children or the big banner they draped across the kitchen cabinets: “Welcome Home Daddy.”

Beninati, a 20-year member of the Virginia Air National Guard, had been away for only two weeks. Still, two weeks is a long time when your husband regularly serenades you with “You Are My Sunshine” and “I Love You Truly.” Two weeks is a long time when your father views joking and camping as some of life's greatest blessings.

“Quite a husband, quite a father,” his wife, Bonnie, said Sunday. “You don't find husbands and fathers like him.”

Beninati was a native of Long Island, N.Y. Besides Amy, he and Bonnie have raised Julie, 13, Jared, 9, and Kenan, 7.

The Beninatis met as students at East Coast Bible College in North Carolina, where they both earned degrees in elementary education. He left teaching 14 years ago so they could start a family. He had worked since for Dominion Virginia Power, rising from meter reader to project designer.

Throughout, the former Navy man served in the Virginia Air National Guard.

The family attended the Azalea Garden Church of God in Norfolk, where Beninati served as an elder, Sunday school teacher and leader in the Royal Rangers, a boys' group.

Longtime Pastor Aubrey D. Maye on Sunday described Beninati to parishioners as a ``hero of faith,' who lived what he preached.

Daily examples were many, from assisting a 93-year-old neighbor with everyday chores to traveling to Ecuador in 1992 to help build an orphanage.

Staff Sgt. Paul J. Blancato, 38

They hadn't set a date.

But Paul Blancato and his fiancee, Maria ``Terry' Rodriguez, had big plans.

They talked about Blancato retiring from the Air National Guard after nearly 20 years, about starting an air-conditioning business in Norfolk. They wanted, some day, to sell their homes here and move the business to Cocoa Beach, Fla.

On Thursday, Blancato called Rodriguez from Florida with good news: He was probably coming home a day earlier than expected.

“I just can't believe he's gone,” Rodriguez said Sunday.

They'd been dating for nearly two years. Both were married once before and had a little trepidation about getting married again. Rodriguez said she knew this time it would last.

“This man's got the most beautiful smile,” she said. “He just grabbed my heart from the beginning.”

A native of Jersey City, N.J., Blancato was in several foster homes throughout his childhood and as an adult, rarely looked back. His family now includes a 13-year-old son, Daniel, who lives in North Carolina.

Blancato worked for years as a butcher at the U.S. Naval Commissary, but was eager to start a new career. He spent his free time working on his home in West Ocean View and on his Dodge truck.

Friend Bryan S. Bebout said Blancato would watch after his family when Bebout was out of town and brought his daughter stuffed animals whenever he visited. Bebout was going to be the couple's best man.

“He had honor, and he had heart - whatever you needed.”

Tech. Sgt. Ernest Blawas, 47

Ernie Blawas called his 24-year-old daughter, Janean Breuss, last week from New Orleans, where he and his Virginia Air National Guard buddies were celebrating Mardi Gras.

“He was having fun, the best time of his life,” Breuss recalled on Sunday as she gathered with friends and family at the Virginia Beach home of her mother, Barbara Detar, Blawas' former wife.

As untimely as her father's death was, at least he was doing something he loved, Breuss said.

“He loved to travel,” she said. “That was his main thing. He wanted to go anywhere and everywhere he could.”

Blawas' military career dates to 1976, when he joined the Army as an infantryman, his ex-wife said. He got a $5,000 bonus for that, she remembered.

It was the same year that Detar gave birth to their twin daughters, Janean and Christina.

Christina is married and living in San Diego. She gave birth to Blawas' first grandchild three years ago.

At a Sunday briefing for the families of the deceased Guardsmen, Blawas was remembered for being a fun-loving, free-spirited person.

“If you didn't like Ernie, you didn't like anybody,” Detar said.

Breuss said part of what makes her father's death so sad is that she is three months pregnant.”`I was kind of hoping he would be able to share that (spirit) with his grandchildren.”

Staff Sgt. Andrew H. Bridges, 33

Andy Bridges was in constant motion.

He rode a Harley, was two steps from becoming a black belt in karate. He had two jobs, as a firefighter and paramedic, and as a hospital lab technician at Maryview.

And Bridges was a family man, who worked hard so that his wife, Tina, could stay home with their two daughters, 9-year-old Erica and 1-year-old Madison.

Sundays were spent with friends munching on chicken wings and watching wrestling at the Bridges' Deep Creek home. During work days, his wife and their daughters would come up to the fire station - their home away from home.

“They were just so happy together,” said Amy Baydowicz, a family friend and a paramedic who worked with Bridges.

A veteran of the U.S. Coast Guard, Bridges worked 6 1/2 years as a paramedic and became a firefighter about a year ago. He learned quickly, but when he wasn't sure, he asked questions, co-workers said. Lots of questions.

He was a hazardous materials team member and recently volunteered to attend a weeklong training session, Capt. Michael Winslow said.

“He wanted to get that edge that he had” as a paramedic, Winslow said. “Andy was a can-do person.”

Master Sgt. Eric G. Bulman, 59

The framed certificates hang in Eric Bulman's office. They are tributes to a life of service, to a military career that started in 1967.

That's when he was drafted into the U.S. Army and sent to Vietnam. Later he served with the Army National Guard and was a first lieutenant with the Civil Air Patrol. He joined the Virginia Air National Guard about four years ago.

“What can I say? The old man was pretty patriotic,” said Greg S. Bulman as he sat behind his father's desk at Technical & Environmental Services Inc., the business he started about 17 years ago.

Bulman described his father as a hard-working businessman and a loving dad. He was a licensed land surveyor who started TES after graduating with a master's degree in construction management from the University of Houston. He also had taught surveying classes at Old Dominion University, Tidewater Community College and Norfolk Technical Vocational Center.

“Right now we're just shocked,” said Artie Bulman, one of Eric Bulman's three younger brothers, all Beach residents. All four brothers were raised in Virginia Beach by the late Alice and Arthur Bulman Jr.

Bulman had three children and two stepsons, and he was less than a year from retiring from the Guard. He was engaged to Rebecca L. Smith.

She said he loved to play golf, to fly, to see the world.

He hated to shave.

He only did it when he had to, like when he was in the service.

A picture of a tall, slender, clean-shaven Bulman in Army camouflage in Vietnam sits on his office shelf. His son said Bulman used to take that picture down sometimes.

“He always looked at this photo when he felt bad, to remind himself that he'd made it through worse days.”

Staff Sgt. Paul E. Cramer, 43

He called himself The Bald Guy.

Paul Cramer started shaving his head when he and his wife of 17 years were divorced three years ago, but naturally he turned it into a joke.

“He didn't have a hang-up about it. He was proud of it,” said Jamie Pittman of Virginia Beach, Cramer's ex-wife and mother of his three children.

Cramer even named his business after his smooth pate. His newest cap read TBG Handyman Services on the front, ``The Bald Guy' on the back.

When he wasn't remodeling homes and apartments in Norfolk and Portsmouth, Cramer spent as much time as he could with Benjamin, 14, Sarah, 10, and Isaac, 6.

“He was a very good daddy,” Pittman said.

Cramer was an assistant Scoutmaster with Troop 902, where his oldest son is a Life Scout, one step below Eagle. He also was an active member of the First Baptist Church of Norfolk.

Besides his kids, Cramer is survived by his father, Henry, a sister, Ruth Ann, of Nebraska and a brother, Mark, of Oklahoma.

Cramer grew up on his family's Nebraska dairy farm, but gave up open spaces for the open sea, joining the Navy in 1979. He spent most of that career aboard Spruance-class destroyers, including the Norfolk-based Caron and Radford, serving as an electronic warfare technician. A Persian Gulf War veteran, he left the Navy in 1991 as a petty officer first class.

Cramer joined the Virginia Air National Guard a few years after leaving the Navy and served in the 203rd Red Horse Flight as a heavy-equipment operator.

He worked for Beach Ford and Hall Honda before going to work at Cox Communications. About six years ago, he started moonlighting as a handyman and made it a full-time business three years ago.

“He was excellent with tools,” Pittman said. “He could build anything from a schematic, just give him some plans and he could do it. I think that's how he expressed his love to his family, through the things he built around here.”

“All he had was the kids and the business,” said Rich McKenney, a friend and former co-worker at Cox. “And he had a little dog…”

He also had a dry sense of humor.

“If you got six e-mails from him, five were going to be jokes,” McKenney said. “He was a guy who looked for the lighter side of everything.”

Tech. Sgt. Michael E. East, 40

When a squall ripped across the Eastern Shore and toppled a cherry tree in his neighbor's yard a few years ago, Michael East picked up his chain saw and headed that way.

“He was over here asking if he could help,” Mike Merrill said. “He volunteered. He was that type of person.”

Neighbors, friends and family recalled East the same way: eager to pitch in.

“From the time he was just a little blond-headed boy, he wanted to help,” said his aunt, Sally Taylor. “Not much of a talker - just a doer. There never was a time when he was too busy.”

East was a longtime member of the National Guard. He lived in Parksley, the Accomack County town where he grew up, and shared a house with Elizabeth Manske and their 10-year-old daughter, Savannah.

“He was a very good father who loved his little girl,” said Chief Master Sgt. Donnie Davis, a close friend.

East worked as an electrician for a NASA contractor at Wallops Island, the space agency's facility near Chincoteague, Davis said, adding: ``He was very good at what he did.'

He planned to upgrade the wiring at Davis' home; he helped some neighbors with electrical problems. When he wasn't stringing wire, he liked to hunt and fish.

He also served on the Parksley Volunteer Fire Company for 10 years. He was an emergency medical technician, and in 1986 - his final active year - he served as chief. He helped deliver a baby in the back of an ambulance once, said company President Fred Matthews. He still dropped in at the department.

“There's a lot of guys like him on the Eastern Shore,” Merrill said. “They're quiet; they keep to themselves. They're here if they can help you out. And they mind their own business.”

Staff Sgt. Ronald L. Elkin, 43

His signature greeting – “How are you today, dear?” - was well-known among co-workers at Chesapeake General Hospital. When a colleague's car wouldn't start, he was the guy who stayed late to give him a jump. And if the jump failed, Ronald Elkin would drive out of his way to deliver the stranded worker home.

His friends said Sunday that he treated his hospital job and his National Guard role the same way: With friendly respect. In his off hours he golfed, watched auto racing and spent time with his family's dog, Dinky.

Elkin moved to Norfolk from Pennsylvania about 11 years ago with his then-girlfriend, Carol, leaving behind four children - Robert Prutznal, 29; Robin Spiers, 27; 21-year-old Ronald Elkin Jr.; and Donna Elkin, 19.

He and Carol married seven years ago. He also twice became a grandfather.

“He was a kind, loving and caring guy who treated everyone equally,” Carol said.

In the 203rd, Elkin was a pavement construction equipment journeyman.

Staff Sgt. James P. Ferguson, 41

He was the classic bachelor. He loved watching his hometown Detroit Lions and working on cars. If it were not for thoughtful friends, he wouldn't have a single kitchen appliance. His best buddy was his 8-year-old black Labrador, Lito.

James Patrick Ferguson grew up in a large family, but his life in Newport News was a relatively solitary one.

“He wasn't shy,” said Josephine Harlan, who knew Ferguson for 20 years. “He just stayed to himself.”

Josephine and her husband, Craig, were Ferguson's closest friends. They socialized several times a week and spent holidays together. Ferguson even lived with the couple for a few years after he left the Navy in the late '70s, and Craig helped Ferguson land a job as an electrician in a shipyard where he worked. When Josephine and Craig were married in 1982, Ferguson gave the bride away.

Ferguson, who never married, had no children of his own. But he was four times a godfather to nieces and nephews - and to the Harlans' granddaughter, Roxanne.

“We are his family here,” Josephine said.

Ferguson loved being a staff sergeant in the Virginia Air National Guard. He joined the 203rd in 1996, and it wasn't unusual for him to rack up four assignments a year.

“He was always ready to volunteer,” Craig Harlan said. “If they had a need for his expertise he'd always say, ‘I'll go. I'll go.’”

Staff Sgt. Randy V. Johnson, 40

When he called Friday night and his wife wasn't home, Randy V. Johnson left a message for his 9-month-old daughter, LaDeja.

“Pick up the phone, baby,” he said. “It's your daddy.”

He was calling to tell his wife, LaVerne, when to meet his plane Saturday.

Johnson loved the military. He loved basketball, and at 6-foot-3 cleaned up in neighborhood pickup games. He loved to fish, too.

Most of all, he loved his daughter, his only child after marrying four years ago.

“She was his angel,” LaVerne Johnson said Sunday, surrounded by family and friends at their home. “She just meant everything to him.”

Johnson was born in Emporia and grew up there, but moved to Maryland while in high school to live with a sister. He joined the Air Force after graduation, spent eight years on active duty, then joined the reserves.

“He was the baby of our family - two brothers, five sisters,” said Carolyn Patterson, his oldest sister. “He was a very loving person, so gentle and kind. We always teased him about being a bachelor for so long.”

Johnson worked for Toll Brothers, an Emporia company that builds frames for prefabricated homes and mobile homes. He was a utility maintenance man in the 203rd, his wife said.

He had recently joined the usher board at Little Shiloh Baptist Church, where he seldom missed a Sunday.

“He was a loving, sweet, kind-hearted man,” LaVerne Johnson said. “He loved to smile and joke.”

It was like him, she said, to leave a message begging his baby girl to pick up the phone.

Sr. Airman Mathrew E. Kidd, 23

Ann Holmes isn't sure what she'll miss most about her neighbor. The wave Mathrew Kidd always gave her as he let out his chocolate Labrador, J.D., for a run in the yard; his smile as he took off for work at ADT Security or for the gym at nearby Langley Air Force Base.

Or his polite requests for a tool so he and his brother, Dan, could tinker on their cars. Or maybe his pleas for Ann's help in sewing patches onto his uniform.

Last year “he had just gotten a new rank, he had inspection coming up and he had to have them in a hurry,” she said Sunday. “You couldn't have asked for a nicer boy.”

Her husband, Lester, said it wasn't unusual for the brothers' place to be quiet on weekends, as they busied themselves as young men do - dating, traveling and such. But the house looked lonesome Sunday. J.D.'s face was in a front window. The trucks in the driveway were cold.

The Holmeses didn't know Mathrew Kidd well; he and his brother had lived next door for just two of the 37 years the couple has spent in the neighborhood.

Still, Ann Holmes wept when she heard the news.

Master Sgt. Michael E. Lane, 34

Narrow lanes wind among the trees at the Wedgewood Lakes Mobile Home Park outside Moyock, N.C. In a cul-de-sac along Cypress Court, friends and relatives gathered to comfort Michael Lane's family.

Cars filled the yard of the tidy white mobile home. Cries could be heard inside as a family friend stepped out to greet visitors.

“It's too soon,” she said. “His mother can't talk about this.”

She refused to talk about Lane or his life. They had seen TV news reports depicting the crash site, and believed them to be invasions of the family's privacy.

Few park residents were aware that a neighbor had been lost. Wedgewood Lakes is a transient place, they said, with people staying pretty much to themselves.

Tech. Sgt. Edwin B. Richardson, 48

He was Butch to friends and neighbors in the Malibu neighborhood of Virginia Beach - a friendly guy, always asking after you, making sure you were OK.

“He used to help me out with my heater and different things,” neighbor Ronald Henline said. “He was just a super good gentleman.”

He was a man, said neighbor Charles Proffer, “you couldn't help but like.”

Richardson was a 1972 graduate of Kempsville High School who met his wife, Beverly, when they were 16. They have two sons - Tommy in middle school, Matthew in high school. He doted on them, coaching their youth baseball teams. The family also has a chocolate Lab named Coco.

A Navy civil service employee, Richardson maintained heating and air-conditioning systems at Oceana. On Coconut Lane, where he'd lived since the mid-1980s, he earned a reputation as a handyman. It wasn't unusual to see him out in the yard, tinkering with his car, an older Volvo wagon.

During visits on Proffer's patio, Richardson loved talking about one of his dreams - owning a Harley-Davidson. He was big on the military, too. He joined the Air Force after high school and had served in the Air National Guard for most, if not all, of the years Proffer knew him.

On the day two weeks ago that he left for the Air Guard's Florida training mission, Richardson and Henline chatted. Richardson was in uniform and wanted to know if one of Henline's sons had considered joining the Reserves.

“He was telling me about all the benefits, like retirement,” Henline said. “He got me a recruiter's card.”

On an Internet Web site designed to link people with former high school classmates, Richardson wrote of having two boys “that get much better grades than I did.” He still wanted to travel the world and buy that motorcycle.

Less adventurous but more important, the big “future event” he looked forward to?

He wanted to buy a new home for his family.

Tech. Sgt. Dean J. Shelby, 39

Dean J. Shelby knew 20th wedding anniversaries were something special. He and his wife missed celebrating theirs because of his National Guard duties in Florida. They'd planned to make up for it this weekend.

Trips away were not uncommon in the near-decade he and his family had lived at the entrance of a quiet Bellamy Plantation cul-de-sac. On Sunday, family and neighbors clustered around his distraught wife, Lucinda - ``Cindy' to everyone.

He was quiet but friendly, said those who knew him, someone who did more than he was asked. He maintained the computers at Newport News' Denbigh High School for the past three years, but also set up schoolwide broadcasting capability, worked to create a technology honor society and taught teachers a thing or two on their laptops.

“I say he goes beyond the call of duty when he shows teachers how they can enhance instruction,” principal Michael W. Evans Sr. said.

”He likes to run - he was always out running,” neighbor Phyllis P. Kauflin said.

”Being on the corner, he always had to be busy, mowing,” added her husband Francis P. Kauflin with a laugh.

The Shelbys' son, Zachary, is stationed with the Army in Maryland. Their daughter, Amanda, is a sophomore at Salem High. The Kauflins would drive them to religion classes at the Church of the Ascension, where Dean sometimes helped Cindy teach confirmation class.

The priest celebrating 8:45 a.m. Mass on Sunday mentioned the accident in his sermon, not knowing his parishioner was a victim. The message: Don't put off important things. We never know what life has in store, he said.

Dean Shelby didn't put off important things.

He had sent anniversary flowers home ahead of him from Florida.

Staff Sgt. John L. Sincavage, 27

John Sincavage was the kind of guy many think of when they hear the word “neighbor.”

“I'm kind of afraid of heights,” said Jim Farrell, who lived next door to Sincavage. “He'd go up on the roof for me.”

Another neighbor, Brian Parton, paid Sincavage perhaps the ultimate compliment: “I felt comfortable giving him the key to my house.”

A Virginia Wesleyan graduate, Sincavage worked for Nationwide Insurance and was active in Habitat for Humanity.

He was a born leader, said Master Sgt. Jay Brown, support services supervisor for the 203rd Red Horse Unit of the Virginia Air National Guard.

“I knew him from the day he came here,” Brown said. “A great kid, great personality, just a joy to be around.”

He was living in Northern Virginia nine years ago when he joined the Guard as a way to help put himself through college, Brown said. He became an equipment operator for the 203rd, working on graders, loaders and dump trucks.

“He was a very good soldier and a very good representative of the Air National Guard and the 203rd,” Chief Master Sgt. Gerald De Vault said.

Described as a “super nice” person, Sincavage was among the first to offer help if anyone needed it, though he preferred to do so inconspicuously, De Vault said.

“He was well-respected in this unit,” Brown said. “He never had to be motivated. He just presented a very good image all-around.”

Staff Sgt. Gregory Skurupey, 34

Gregory Skurupey grew up in Blacksburg and met his wife, Kathy, while she was a student at Virginia Tech.

They have two children, a 9-year-old son, Logan, and a 5-year-old daughter, Sheridan. They live in rural Gloucester County, in the Ware Neck community.

For the past month, he worked at H.B. Hankins as an operator of pavement and construction equipment.

His 13th wedding anniversary would have been next Monday.

On Sunday, he would have turned 35.

Staff Sgt. Richard L. Summerell, 51

When the floods of Hurricane Floyd hit in the fall of 1999, Richard L. Summerell didn't worry right away about his downtown vacuum cleaner business.

He worried about his neighbors.

“He was down there every day,” said the Rev. David S. Dillon, a close friend and pastor at Rock Church of Franklin. “He was part of that community effort.”

Summerell was known for his mechanical skills, not only with vacuums but other appliances and telephone systems.

“There's probably nothing on this earth that's mechanical that he couldn't fix,” Dillon said. “We all used to say if it was broken, ask Rick.”

Summerell's dedication to the National Guard Red Horse unit and to his faith in Christ shows in his children.

His son, Danny, is a Red Horse member, and his youngest daughter, Mary, attends a Christian college.

“He was the type of guy who said, ‘Jesus didn't hang out in synagogues.’ He was out helping people, and that's how he ran his business,” Dillon said. “He didn't like to write the invoices. He had that type of serving heart.”

Summerell had been married for about 25 years. He and his wife, Ellen, raised four children. Ellen and Mary, home from college, had gone to pick up Summerell Saturday morning. They were at the base when they received the news.

At Sunday morning's Rock Church service, the congregation gathered around the alter and fell to their knees.

“We prayed for him and his family,” Dillon said, “and we prayed for the other families.”

Maj. Frederick “Rick” V. Watkins III, 35

He had Paul Newman eyes and an infectious smile.

But Frederick “Rick” V. Watkins III will likely best be remembered for his endearing spirit.

“He was always encouraging someone and very supportive,” said Fred Watkins, Rick's father. “He was strong in his faith, and I believe when all of this happened, he was there praying with and encouraging the others.”

A 1984 graduate of Princess Anne High School, Rick Watkins originally saw the military as a way to pay for college. He graduated from Virginia Tech in 1988. He served 12 years with the Army Corps of Engineers before landing a job with the Navy.

“He enjoyed his job … and he was the type of person everyone enjoyed working with,” Naval Reserve Lt. Dave Millinor said.

He knew there were risks.

“He told his sister at one point that if anything ever happened to him during one of his deployments to know that he went down doing what he loved,” Fred Watkins said.

Nothing, however, came before his sons, Joshua, 7, and Colton, 4. If he wasn't playing with them on the soccer fields, he was in a canoe, rowing them down a lazy waterway. Watkins was an avid outdoorsman, an interest that also bonded him with his father. They hunted and fished together.

“Not only was he a son and a father, he was a great friend,” the elder Watkins said. “He was one of the best guys I've ever known.”

OTHER VICTIMS

The crash also claimed the lives of one quarter of a 12-member Army National Guard unit based in Lakeland, Fla. Three members of the 171st Aviation Battalion, with a combined 68 years of military experience, were flying the plane on the routine transport flight: Chief Warrant Officer John W. Duce, 49, Orange Park, Fla.; Chief Warrant Officer Eric P. Larson, 34, Land-O-Lakes, Fla.; Staff Sgt. Robert F. Ward Jr., 35, Lakeland, Fla.

“They were all very experienced,” Sgt. Steve Valley said. “If anything was to happen on a flight, this was the crew that you would want.”

Chief Warrent Officer John W. Duce, one of the pilots on Saturday's flight, had 30 years of service. Duce, who was a full-time Guardsman, is survived by his wife, Miechell, and two children: Justin, 17, and Danielle, 12.

The other pilot, Eric P. Larson, was a commercial airline pilot. He had 18 years of military service. He and his wife, Jennifer, had no children.

The flight engineer, Robert F. Ward Jr., was a full-time Guardsman with 20 years of military service. Ward is survived by his wife, Glenda, and a stepdaughter, Sharon K. Grace, 30.