The equipment manager of the Prince George Cougars is feeling the sting of Friday’s bus crash involving the Humboldt Broncos that killed 15 people.
Chico Dhanjal used to work for the SJHL club when advancing through the junior hockey ranks and is from nearby Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.
He says the whole thing felt pretty surreal.
“After seeing the news reports and getting the messages from friends in Humboldt and keeping close attention to the news feed it just started to sink in and it harder and harder, waking up Saturday morning and hearing about the number of people who passed away was unbelievable.”
When asked where he was when the accident first broke, Dhanjal responded by saying he was at home with his family.
“I was getting ready to cook supper and then I got a phone call from a friend of mine who told me to put the news on and sure enough I turned it on and started to call some friends back in Humboldt, people we just visited last year to see what was going on and if it was even real.”
“It was like an utter shock for the whole night, not just with me but for the whole night and my two kids are trying to figure out what’s wrong with me and I’m trying to explain to them what is happening, luckily, I have such a great wife making sure I am okay.”
The long-time equipment manager is fully accustomed to the tight-knit Saskatchewan city where he was part of a national championship during the 2007-08 season where the Broncos went 48-9-1 and won the SJHL’s Canalta Cup, Anavet Cup, and the RBC Cup under Dean Brockman as head coach.
“When I was there we had alumni set up for our team that won the national championship and we were talking all day Saturday and Sunday with each other – we’ve come up with a couple of ideas and we are just going to wait and make sure the team is okay with this and to make sure the money that gets raised goes to the right places.”
“The whole community coming together making sure everybody is okay and that people who need help actually get help, surrounding communities like Lanigan and Bruno and all of those small little towns coming together making sure people are going to be fine as well as billet families and parents of the kids.”
The entire country and the rest of the world has come together in spades over the last 72 hours showing an outpouring of support for the tragedy on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.
Dhanjal hopes we never see a tragedy like this ever again.
A similar incident occurred back in 1986 when four players with the Swift Current Broncos of the WHL were killed claiming the lives of Trent Kresse, Scott Krueger, Chris Mantyka and Brent Ruff.
The Prince George Cougars are also asking residents to come and write encouraging messages on a banner at the CN Centre Tuesday and Wednesday from 9AM to 9PM.
It will then be sent to the City of Humboldt after the Cats take a photo of everyone with the banner outside the arena.
For more information, you can click here.
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(Video courtesy of Ryan Switzer/YouTube)