Longtime Muni operator dies after falling ill while driving bus
Antonio Cahilig, a Muni operator who had been with the transportation agency for 19 years, died early Saturday morning after falling “severely ill” while on duty, Muni officials said.
The officials said Cahilig, 61, had been traveling northbound on Noe Street on the 24 Divisadero route in San Francisco shortly after 5 a.m., when the illness struck.
The bus he was driving struck nearby parked cars, but Muni said the vehicle was empty and no one was injured.
He was taken to San Francisco General Hospital, where he died.
Cahilig’s wife of 35 years, Jennifer Cahilig, told The Chronicle that he was the type of person to hand over whatever bills he had in his pocket to homeless people on the street.
“I feel lucky that he picked me out of all the females,” she said through tears. “He was loving, caring, supportive. He was pure. He was real. That’s what he was.”
When it came to work, Cahilig was “serious and by the book,” she said, and was well known by people taking transit and community leaders. She said at times, they would walk down the street in San Francisco, and he would exchange pleasantries with passersby.
“He would always say ‘hi’ to people and I’m wondering, ‘How do you know all them?’ ” she said. “But he knew a lot of people. He was just a friendly person.”
Cahilig was born and raised in San Francisco’s Richmond District. As a youth, Jennifer Cahilig said, he delivered newspapers for The Chronicle. He served four years in the Army before working as a pastry chef for a Marriott hotel near San Francisco International Airport. His skills in the kitchen, particularly his way of decorating wedding cakes, garnered praise, she said. After nearly 20 years as a pastry chef, he joined Muni as an operator.
Jennifer Cahilig said he was a longtime staple in San Francisco’s lowrider community, where he would cruise with friends and compete against other motorists with his 1970sera Lincoln Continental outfitted with hydraulics, his multicolored vehicle bouncing to the beat of music blasting from his car.
Jeffrey Tumlin, Muni’s director of transportation, said in a statement that the “SFMTA family are griefstricken at the loss of Antonio.”
“On behalf of all the staff at the SFMTA, I extend my deepest condolences to Antonio’s family and friends,” Tumlin said. “His dedication, and that of all our customerfacing, essential workers, is the pride of our agency.”
Cahilig leaves behind three adult children and two grandchildren.