Piper Gutzler’s desk no longer holds her belongings in her fourth-grade classroom, but rather letters and pictures from her schoolmates. Similar remembrances found their way into her locker at the southern Illinois school on students’ first day back since the rural plane crash that killed Piper, her parents and a cousin while sparing her younger sister.
Counselors were on hand to help students process the weekend tragedy that has many people in the 3,200-resident town of Nashville grappling with grief.
The Gutzlers, a gregarious family who operated a local furniture business, were traveling home from a Florida vacation when their small place crashed in Kentucky. The only survivor was 7-year-old Sailor Gutzler, who – while bloodied and broken-boned – walked nearly a mile through the dark woods to find help.
“There wasn’t a whole lot of math and English taught today,” the school’s principal, Chuck Fairbanks, said Monday. “Today, in the long run, was a chance to do the best teaching our teachers could do: help these kids learn how to cope with something like this.”
The girls’ father, Marty Gutzler – a licensed commercial pilot and flight instructor – was piloting the Piper PA-34 when it crashed Friday night, killing his wife, Kim, along with 9-year-old Piper and her cousin, 14-year-old Sierra Wilder. Federal investigators are still trying to piece together what happened. A preliminary report from the National Transportation Safety Board could come as soon as next week.