The family of the victim who died in Tuesday’s Del Rio area mobile home collapse has identified the man as Will Bailey. Bailey is originally from New York.
First responders said the moving company was in the process of moving a vacant mobile home to the Northside from the Del Rio neighborhood when it collapsed.
When the home collapsed, neighbors said it trapped Bailey who was working on it. The company Bailey worked for was New Beginning & Start LLC, his family said.
"When I had dropped him off yesterday morning at work and then I went back to take him some cigarettes and some lunch money and stuff, and it [the mobile home] didn't look safe to me," Bailey's wife Melanie said.
"When I was taking my husband to work, he said he had a bad feeling about today," Melanie said.
Later that day, she got a call her husband had died.
"It was like my heart was being ripped out. Like I lost my life," Melanie said.
New Beginning & Start told First Coast News through a statement employees were planning on moving the home, but due to the condition of the home, they decided to tear it down. Tuesday, the statement said, they were getting their equipment out of the home.
“I wanted to tell him well, 'I don’t want you to go to work, and turn around and come home,' but he had his mind set on something," Melanie said.
Bailey's three kids and wife said he was like a big kid who loved the outdoors.
"He had a huge spirit that lit up the room, no matter if he was mad, sad, happy," Bailey's daughter Nevaeh Bailey said.
"He was a hard worker and a good dad," one of Bailey's sons said
Wednesday, Melanie picked up Bailey's things from detectives.
"Picking up all of his belongings and stuff, it made it real," she said. "It made it final that he wasn’t going to wake up, that he wasn’t going to come home,” Melanie said.
According to Melanie, bosses at New Beginning & Start said they would help with anything the family needs.
First Coast News has reached out to New Beginning & Start LLC about the incident, they released the following statement:
“This has been a terrible lost[sic] of not only a great contractor but also a great friend.
We wanted to address the comments as well as the concerns of the home and inform that we were not in attempt to move the home, but in the process of removing our equipment from the home.
After a lot of consideration and evaluation of the condition of the home and not finding a resolution to safely move the home to the customers property, it was decided that it was best just to demo the home.
We had other crews come out to observe the condition of the home and see if there was any way to salvage the home, however they had all come to the same conclusion that the home would fall apart during transport.
As a company we take pride in not only our work, but the safety of our staff as well our customers best interest.
Going forward [sic] will continue to study, find, and create more safety precautions so that accidents like will never reoccur.
At this time, as we continue to pray for William’s wife and children, we also ask that the city does the same. For this has been a terrible loss for them first hand.”
Family members said they are raising money through a Facebook fundraiser to fly Bailey and part of his family that lives in Jacksonville to New York for his funeral. They are also reaching out to talk with the moving company. The family has created a GoFundMe page to help cover funeral expenses.
