Priest who comforted the injured and dying recalls ‘it was a very difficult day’
FATHER Anthony David had been a priest for just 45 days when he received the call which changed his life.
The Catholic priest was living at the Order of St Paul, the First Hermit monastery at Eagle Heights, when the phone rang on the afternoon of September 25, 1990, asking for a priest to rush to the scene of a bus crash. Without thinking, the then-45-year-old put on his robes picked up his bible and was driven to the scene of carnage on Henri Robert Drive where the wreckage of a tour bus lay on its side.
Fr David walked down the embankment and went to work, kneeling to give the last rites to the injured and dying.
“You could never forget it. I saw people there who needed to be helped spiritually so I went to do that. I prayed over them, I anointed them. There were bodies under the tarpaulin. They were elderly people.
“I hope the prayers helped them and whatever suffering they endured would turn out to be purgatory enough for them.
“It was a very difficult day. I prayed with them quietly and the ones who were conscious appreciated it.”
Fr David, now 75 years old, today lives and works in Canungra but no longer remembers the prayers he said that day during his three hours at the horrific scene of a crash which claimed 11 lives.
But his presence at the scene has never been forgotten by any of the emergency services workers there that day, with those who reminisced in the lead up to the anniversary all recalling Fr David walking among the carnage and providing comfort.
“I think for me seeing him. I think that’s when it hit home,” said ambulance officer Cary Strong who was at the
scene. “You don’t normally see that in a mass casualty.
“To see the priest, you’re thinking, hang on, technically I know what he’s doing.
“That’s when it hit, the magnitude of what we were dealing with.”
Memorable photographs of Fr David giving the last rites and comforting people were taken at the scene by the press photographers and were republished on the front pages of newspapers across the country the next morning.
Gold Coast Bulletin photographer Paul Trezsise was recognised at the Rothmans National Press Photo Awards for his photo of the priest.
Fr David said he had no idea the pictures had been taken until he saw the newspapers the next morning: “I wasn’t aware it had even been taken and I wasn’t bothered about it at all then but it was the only time I have ever seen my own face on a newspaper’s front page.
“It is hard to believe 30 years have passed but I hope we never have another bus crash like that, god willing,” Fr David said.