A heartbroken Steven Ensminger, Jr. said he now texts his late wife a response that he never had the chance to write.
Ensminger’s spouse, sports journalist Carley McCord, texted him that she loved him before she died in a private plane crash that killed five people.
“It’s the first thing I think about when I wake up and the last thing I think about when I finally fall asleep,” Ensminger told ABC News. “Every once in a while throughout the day, I find myself grabbing my phone and sending a text to her phone replying, ‘I love you too.’ Now I don’t know if that’s crazy of me or not, but I’m praying she gets my message. And I wish there was a way she could let me know she has.”
McCord, a reporter for the New Orleans television station WDSU, had departed Lafayette, Louisiana, on Saturday, en route to Atlanta to cover LSU’s Peach Bowl clash with Oklahoma. Ensminger Jr., whose father is LSU offensive coordinator Steve Ensminger, said in a previous interview he was in agony for missing his wife’s call and text before the fatal crash. He said he was never able to reply.
Ensminger said the heartwrenching news was delivered to him from his aunt on Saturday: “My aunt Betty called and she told me I need to sit down right now and listen carefully,” he recalled. “And that’s when my world fell apart.”
He told CNN of McCord: “She was my everything. ….She is and will forever be my world.”
According to National Transportation Safety Board Vice Chairman Bruce Landsberg, no distress call was made by the small private plane before the fatal crash. The plane took off and reached 900 feet before it started a “left descending turn,” Landsberg told reporters on Sunday. Eye witnesses reported seeing the plane strike power lines, according to the NTSB investigation.
“Either way it’s done and she can’t come back,” Ensminger told ABC News. “So the ‘how’ is irrelevant to me now. I guess I just have to have faith in that God has a plan and that I will get through this and be better for it and I will honor her in whatever I do.”
McCord worked as both an in-game host for the New Orleans Saints and Pelicans. The teams released a joint statement expressing condolences and praising the reporter’s “infectious personality.” Both teams also held moment of silences before their respective games over the weekend.
SOURCE: USA Today, Scott Gleeson
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