‘Horrifying’: Tiny Arkansas community mourns loss of family killed in Michigan blast
As Northfield Township police continue to investigate what caused a house explosion that killed four family members who were visiting from Arkansas, many in their hometown are grieving.
"Yesterday, I was crying on and off all morning — thinking about them," family friend Matthew Rooney, 40, told the Free Press. "I can’t get it out of my head. I just keep imagining their last moments."
Hope and Don Bragg, in their 50s, along with their three children — Kenny, a Michigan Tech student; Beth, a college freshman in Arkansas, and Stephen, a schoolboy — were in the house with Hope’s father, Rich Pruden.
Rooney — who said he was a family friend and colleague and has a son in the same school as Stephen, who along with Pruden, survived and is hospitalized — called the unexplained Saturday afternoon explosion "horrifying."
By early Tuesday, national news outlets were reporting more details, and the Democrat-Gazette, which is sold throughout Arkansas, said mourners were holding candlelight memorials at St. Mark Catholic Church, where the family worshiped.
A police photo shows the blast leveled the house in the 8200 block of Winters Lane. Rooney said Hope and Don Bragg frequently visited it and planned to retire there. Debris, the police report said, scattered debris over two acres.
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The Free Press left a message Tuesday morning with Northfield Township police, who had not yet released the names of the victims, seeking more information about what caused the explosion.
Saturday, township police said that three were killed. By Sunday, however, they confirmed to the Free Press the death toll had climbed to four, with two more in the hospital.
Don and Hope Bragg, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported, were a Forest Service scientist and a University of Arkansas Extension Service 4-H instructor, respectively, adding that they were originally from the Midwest.
But the Democrat-Gazette added that the couple moved to Arkansas decades ago, and had become a vital part of the small community with a population of a little more than 8,000. The Braggs were involved, the newspaper said, in state and local archaeological activities.
Don Gragg, Rooney said, had a doctorate and taught at the University of Arkansas, Monticello; while Hope, was still earning her doctorate, and seemed to know someone everywhere she went in the city.
On Facebook, the College of Forestry, Agriculture, and Natural Resources posted that it mourned "the tragic loss of two of our colleagues and friends," and confirmed, "Don and Hope Bragg were lost along with their daughter and one of their sons in a house explosion."
Kenny, the oldest of Hope and Don’s children in the home, was preparing to graduate from Michigan Tech, Rooney said.
While Beth — who Rooney recalled "made the best desserts," particularly her cheesecakes — had just left home in the fall to start college at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville.
Stephen, a student in the Monticello School District, survived the blast.
But, Superintendent Sandra Lanehart said in a social media post, said Stephen has a "broken pelvis and lacerated liver." And Pruden, she added, is "in a coma," with burns to 20% of his body.
She asked for prayers for Stephen, his family, their friends, colleagues, and classmates, and ended with a touching verse from Psalms about healing broken hearts.
"They were some of the most generous and kind people I’ve ever known and had the pleasure to be around," Rooney said on his Facebook page. "I wish it had been far longer. We’ve really lost out big time."
Contact Frank Witsil: 313-222-5022 or fwitsil@freepress.com.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Deadly Northfield Twp. explosion devastates tiny Arkansas community
