On Monday, grief counselors awaited students returning to a pair of
Carroll County high schools after a weekend crash claimed the lives of two teenagers.
15-year old Emily Burke and 14-year old Rudy Calderon died when the van they were travelling in left Louisville Road in Finksburg and struck a tree.
Burke was a standout athlete in softball, track and soccer at Liberty High, and Calderon was a freshman at Westminster High.
“I talked to the principal at Liberty, and everything for the first couple of hours, you could hear a pin drop this morning,” said Charles Ecker, the Carroll County Superintendent of Schools, “but now it’s getting back to normal and they still had a lot of people taking advantage of the counselors.”
Ecker says psychologists are also counseling student, teachers and faculty members on how to help two teens who survived the crash.
15-year old Alison Hird was Emily Burke’s best friend since they were 5 years old.
Paul Burke, a senior at Liberty High, is Emily’s brother and was driving at the time of the crash.
