A Crack, a Shift, Then Screams: Witnesses Describe Georgia Dock Collapse That Killed 7

They had come to Sapelo Island, just off the curve of the Georgia coast, for a celebration of resilience, of a people, of a culture that for generations had been so fragile but could not be broken.

The smell of smoked mullet drifted. Vendors sold red peas and rice. Performers onstage presented poetry and sang African spirituals.

By midafternoon on Saturday, dozens readied for the trip back to the mainland, a route beginning with a ferry known as the Annemarie waiting at the end of the floating dock in the marsh. But then, a strange cracking noise. The walkway to the dock suddenly shifted. Then it collapsed.

“Everyone’s falling into the water, and you’re hearing screams,” said Michael Wood, 43, who had been waiting in line to board.

On Sunday, members of the tight-knit Gullah Geechee community, descendants of formerly enslaved people in the Southeast, who had gathered for a festival celebrating their heritage, mourned four women and three men, all of them older than 70, who were killed. And officials began investigating how a short journey to the only way off the Georgia island could have led to such tragedy.

“The initial findings of our investigation at this point showed a catastrophic failure of the gangway, causing it to collapse,” said Walter Rabon, the commissioner of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, adding that investigators and engineers will be gathering evidence and interviewing witnesses. Three people were also injured and remain hospitalized in critical condition.