Cycle accidents claim 2 lives

Steven "DJ Scorpio" Hall

The well-known DJ, Scorpio, was killed on Saturday in a deadly traffic accident involving four motorbikes near the Burrell Boom cut-off. Scorpio died before he could reach the hospital but three other cycling officials who were following a race in preparation for the upcoming Holy Saturday Cross Country, were more fortunate. The race, according to cycling aficionados, was not sanctioned by the Belize Cycling Association.  Instead, it was organized by veteran cycling enthusiast Ray Cattouse, as a means of preparing riders for the national race. By all accounts, the scene was bloody and chaotic.  News Five’s Isani Cayetano reports.

The strewn remnants of a high speed pileup, involving several motorbikes tailing a cycling race through the Hattieville/Boom circuit, is a litter of plastic and rubber tossed across an open property near the Northern Highway.  It was the scene of a horrid accident on Saturday morning which claimed the life of popular disc jockey Steven Hall.  Scorpio, as he was famously known, was violently flung from the rear of this mangled red Ninja.

Santino Castillo, Eyewitness

“One of the motorcycle riders couldn’t pull the curve and braked, his motorcycle fishtailed and I understand the others may have bumped into him and caused the them to go off the road.  Alwyn, who is pretty experienced on motorcycling, didn’t touch his brakes.  He jumped the ditch and ended up in mud unscathed and so did Marlon Swift, he ended up in a ditch.  But the two that got the brunt of it were Scorpio and Andrew Ordonez.  They hit a coconut palm tree right there because all the debris was there.  I personally saw Scorpio at the time and he looked pretty bad.”

Santino Castillo

Isani Cayetano

“The deadly road traffic accident occurred here, less than a mile away from the Boom cutoff.  It’s a curve many motorists attest is unassuming but perilous.”

Santino Castillo

“I was training on the Boom Road while they had a race on the Boom Road.  About five miles to the finish, maybe four miles to the finish the frontrunners passed in the front break which were Byron Pope, Brandon Cattouse and Nisan Arana and I jumped behind them and there were five motorcycle riders accompanying them.  Those four being Alwyn [Gonzalez], Marlon Smith, Ordonez, Scorpio and Fitzgerald Joseph.  They stayed with the race and about maybe two miles to the finish they all sped away in a ball of speed to go to the finish.”

Anthony Hunter

Inside his home at the time of the collision was Anthony Hunter, a resident of Ridge Lagoon Estates.  He was first alerted to the screaming engines as the motorcycles rounded the treacherous curve.

Anthony Hunter, Resident

“Well I heard the very high revs of motorcycles and I own one so whenever I hear one I look out to see.  And I heard the ruckus of different pitches and I saw several motorcycles kind of flying through the air by the royal palms and I didn’t realize there were going to be four of them.  After the third one I ran out and went outside and saw what [happened] and I stood around outside and talked to the people that stopped by.  But they hit at very high speed.  From the sound of the motorcycles they were coming around the corner very fast and apparently they could not control it and the things happened.”

Among the first respondents was veteran cyclist Santino Castillo.

Santino Castillo

“When we reached the Bacab curve with the cyclists we saw the four motorcycles in the Bacab yard.  It looked like something out of a movie.  I had never witnessed an accident like that, a motorcycle accident in my life.  They were spread all over the road It was surreal.”

DJ Scorpio, a renowned member of entertainment quartet Belizean Movements, was gravely injured, massively wounding his head and other parts of the body.  Ordonez, on the other hand, broke his right leg and left arm.

Anthony Hunter

“Mr. Ordonez was lying on the ground.  He was semiconscious; he was in a lot of pain.  He had lost a boot and his leg was badly broken and the boot was actually very far from where he landed.  And then Mr. Scorpio was in very bad shape with the side of his head and an open wound and he didn’t look like he was going to make it but they picked him up after some discussion as to whether to move him or not and put him in a pickup and they drove him down to Belize as fast as they could.”

Despite their attempt to rush him to the hospital Hall succumbed to his injuries en route.

Santino Castillo

“They couldn’t wait for an ambulance so they put him and Ordonez in the back of a pickup truck but we don’t know if at that time he was already convulsing if it was just the warmth of his body and that he was already dead.  But I do know that by the time they reached the ambulance at mile seven he had already given his last breath.  All the cyclists we rode to the hospital where I met his mom and everyone at the time and we were all in shock because they had told us that indeed he had passed away before getting to the hospital and he was still in the back of the pickup truck where I personally went to see him and quite honestly ever since then that thing just keeps coming back in my mind.”

At the scene of the accident there was anarchy among the riders.

Anthony Hunter

“It was a bit of chaos.  The race director was out there telling them to stop the race and of course the riders were full pressed on their ride and they didn’t know what to make of it and they had to shout them down a lot to get them to slow down and stop and the race was immediately canceled.”

Reporting for News Five, I am Isani Cayetano.

The second fatal road traffic accident involving a motorcycle occurred on the Hummingbird Highway on Saturday evening.  Shortly before six o’clock, thirty-two year old Belize City fisherman, Elmer Hamilton, was heading toward Dangriga when his motorcycle careened off the highway near mile forty-two. He suffered a massive laceration to the middle of the head, as well as an abrasion to the left side of the back and right foot.  Hamilton was transported to the Western Regional Hospital, but died in the early hours of Sunday morning while undergoing treatment.