Four years after FIU student dies in bridge collapse, FIU honors her and 5 others killed
READ MORE
FIU honors victims of bridge collapse
A bronze sculpture of Alexa Duran, the FIU student who died in 2018 when the FIU pedestrian bridge collapsed as it was being built, will stand on the main FIU campus. Six people died in the collapse.
Expand All
When their 18-year-old daughter died four years ago as she sat at a red light and the Florida International University footbridge collapsed on top of her car, crushing it like a pancake, Gina and Orlando Duran’s Sunday afternoon routine changed forever.
Instead of going to the movies, they now head to Publix to buy flowers to place in a vase affixed to her marble tomb, where a framed oval photo of their smiling daughter sits above her bronze nameplate: Alexa Marina Duran, 1999-2018.
On Tuesday, on the fourth anniversary of the FIU pedestrian bridge collapse at Southwest Eighth Street and 109th Avenue, a split-second catastrophe that killed Alexa, an FIU student, and five others, at least 100 people gathered at FIU’s Modesto A. Maidique Campus for the unveiling of a long-awaited memorial: a 7-foot bronze sculpture of Alexa.
New Jersey artist Brian Hanlon created the $500,000 art piece, financed and commissioned by FIU in accordance with the Durans. The sculpture stands in the heart of the campus, at the center of a new plaza near the Green Library.
Alexa’s became the second sculpture of its type at the largest public university in South Florida; Hanlon also crafted the first in 2017 — a soldier to honor Paul Michael Felsberg, an FIU alum killed in combat in Iraq.
At the ceremony, Alexa’s loved ones carried about 50 balloons: light pink round ones, star-shaped fuchsia ones and a few blush lily ones. They wore white shirts with Alexa’s photograph, and buttons reading, “Alexa Duran” and “Always in our Hearts.”
READ MORE: Their daughter’s iPhone survived - but they can’t unlock it
One of Alexa’s aunts, Gina’s older sister Marta Bayona, traveled from New York to Miami with her husband, Orlando, for the memorial. As she broke down crying, Marta said she flies down for every anniversary because she misses her niece.
“She was very loved,” she said. “She was beautiful, funny, outgoing.”
Honoring those who died that day
The overcast skies fit in with the somber mood.
FIU Interim President Kenneth Jessell stood at the podium at about 1:30 p.m. and told the gathering that “seldom does a day go by” that he doesn’t think about Alexa and the other five victims.
“And while we cannot change the past, we can honor the memory of those we lost,” Jessell said.
Jessell met with the Durans and FIU’s former president Mark Rosenberg before the memorial service. Rosenberg, who abruptly resigned in January amid allegations that he made unwanted advances to a younger woman in his office, didn’t attend the ceremony.
Rosenberg declined to comment about the event Tuesday morning.
“President Rosenberg had worked closely with them for years,” Jessell told the Herald. “It was appropriate for him to meet with them as well and express his feelings on the fourth anniversary.”
At 1:47 p.m. Tuesday, the exact time the bridge fell four years ago, six bells rang and a black curtain fell down, revealing the bronze Alexa.
READ MORE: Bridge design had a key mistake, experts say
Gina jumped up from her front-row seat, clutching her hands and exclaiming: “Throw the balloons, guys, throw the balloons.”
She then sat and grabbed a tissue box as her husband hugged her. Dina Duran, Alexa’s sister, sat by their side.
Jessell then called for a moment of silence.
After the presentation, Orlando walked up to the statue and poked the bronze Alexa’s nose, just like he used to poke his daughter’s real nose.
Alexa’s family and friends snapped photos with the sculpture. One of them placed a bouquet of flowers at her feet.
Five lamp posts surround the sculpture to represent the five other people who died in the bridge collapse. Lights in different colors will emblazon the sculpture on special occasions, like Alexa’s birthday, May 18, and Christmas Day, her favorite holiday.
Hanlon also created 18 doves embracing Alexa from behind, to signify her 18 years of life.
The artist said he got that idea when he first met the Durans, seeing a few birds fly by behind them as they spoke about her.
“I thought it would be both solemn and meaningful, which are two important things for today,” Hanlon told the Herald after the memorial service. He added he would like for his art to turn into a source of education.
“I hope that they learn about her, and that they get some inspiration to be more courageous in their day. They may think that they have problems; in fact, they don’t in the big picture,” he said.
Had plans to become a lawyer
Alexa enrolled at FIU after graduating from Archbishop Edward A. McCarthy High School in Broward in 2017. She was a freshman majoring in political science; she had wanted to attend law school and become an attorney.
The Durans reached out to FIU after the collapse.
“We were very angry. We wanted justice, and justice would have been something damaging to FIU, but my daughter wouldn’t have wanted that, because she was going there and liked FIU,” Orlando said.
The parties finalized the negotiations and settled on a plan in early 2020, Orlando said. The Durans handed over dozens of photos of Alexa to Hanlon. Then the coronavirus pandemic halted everything.
As Hanlon began working on the piece, he consulted with Alexa’s parents. They requested their daughter’s hair to be longer, the birthmark in the middle of her forehead to show, the sole dimple on one side of her mouth to pop.
Gina wanted the sculpted Alexa to wear the white Converse tennis shoes she hardly took off, and they couldn’t imagine her without her cellphone in her hand.
They also asked Hanlon for her to wear her sorority jacket and the blue backpack she carried throughout high school, which displays her nickname: “Rolexa.”
After 18 months, Hanlon finished.
“It will never, never, never be her,” Gina said. “But we did our best so that she looks like her.”
Gina doesn’t know yet whether she and Orlando will visit FIU as frequently as they visit her mausoleum at Vista Memorial Gardens in Miami Lakes.
“Perhaps,” Gina said, looking at the horizon pensively. “Maybe.”
Last Sunday, Gina and Orlando returned to the cemetery. Orlando arranged the new flowers by his daughter’s nameplate, pressing his finger up to Alexa’s photo, the one from her high school prom, kissing it.
He then closed his eyes and talked privately to his daughter, telling her about what’s going on in his life.
Gina, meanwhile, wiped dust from the nameplate and decorated it.
“I try to bring little things from my house so that she has parts of her house here,” Gina said. “I know she’s dead, but I try to make her feel at home.”
This story was originally published March 15, 2022 at 6:08 PM.
