Click here for Mobile Site: http://m.wcco.com
  • Font Size    

Today's Most Popular Video

Swimsuit Cover Model Forgot To Wear Top
E-mail

Close Window E-mail This Page

Neighbors React To Fatal Tour Bus Crash

Required fields are marked with an asterisk(*)

The information you provide will be used only to send the requested e-mail and will not be used to send any other e-mail communications. Read more in our Privacy Policy

Send E-mail

   Print     Share +   
Nov 19, 2009 7:15 pm US/Central

Neighbors React To Fatal Tour Bus Crash

Reporting
John Lauritsen
KASSON, Minn. (WCCO) ― Four people from Kasson, Minn., just west of Rochester, were on the tour bus that crashed on I-90 Wednesday afternoon, including Pamela Holmquist, 56, and her mother Betty.

Betty Holmquist is recovering at Austin Medical Center. Unfortunately her daughter Pamela did not survive the crash.

Neighbors of Betty and Pamela say the news is still a bit tough to swallow.

"We just really thought the world of Betty and (Pamela) both," said Arlene Erickson, a neighbor of the Pamela. "It was very sad for us to hear."

Pamela and Betty Holmquist didn't have any other family in the area, so they spent a lot of time together. At one point, they lived in the same trailer court -- their homes only separated by Roger and Arlene Erickson's home.

"Walk by, when her mother lived there, she'd walk by several times a day," Roger said of Pamela. "If you were out, you'd visit a minute. 'What's going on?' you know. She was a very nice person."

Arlene said Pamela was even there for her when she broke her ankle in two places.

"She'd volunteer to come vacuum for me, or anything like that," she said.

Betty left the neighborhood this summer to move to an assisted living facility in Kasson. Still, the two remained inseparable and Pamela would visit her mother frequently to play cards.

"Did a lot of things with her mother, and for her mother, spent time with her mother," said Mary Iverson, a friend of Pamela. "Her mother didn't go and stay at the trailer court with her, she came and stayed with her mother."

Neither Pamela nor her mother drove. Pamela suffered an aneurysm years ago that kept her from driving, friends said. That was a main reason why they were on the tour bus Wednesday.

Linda St. John, a neighbor, had taken the trip to the casino before but declined to go this time. She said she knew something was wrong when her friends never returned.

"I just figured the bus had some trouble and they sent out another bus to go pick them up and bring them back," she said. "But then I called Strain (Bus Line) and they said, 'Yeah, there was a bus accident.'"

(© MMX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

You need the latest Flash player to view video content.
Click here to download.

Click here to bypass this detection if you already have the latest Flash Player.

Local News

Top News Stories

© MMX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.