Uganda Blast Kills Aid Worker From Delaware
A man from Delaware is reportedly among the more than 60 people killed in bombings in Uganda's capital where crowds had gathered to watch the World Cup final on TV.
Two blasts bearing the hallmarks of international terrorists ripped through crowds at a rugby club and a restaurant in Kampala, Uganda.
KYW's Mike DeNardo reports the American aid group Invisible Children says 25-year-old Nate Henn (photo) of Wilmington, Del. was killed in the rugby club blast.
The group says Henn had worked with the group for a year and a half. He was among the crowd watching the World Cup when two blasts tore through the rugby club and an Ethiopian restaurant. At that restaurant were six members of a church in Selinsgrove (Snyder County), in central Pennsylvania.
The Rev. Kathleen Kind of Christ Community United Methodist Church says the six were on a mission working with a local congregation:
"All six of our members are alive and are wounded with broken bones and also with some gashes, some cuts."
She says their injuries included flesh wounds, temporary blindness, and hearing problems.
Kind says that while her church is thankful their members are alive, they grieve for those who were killed.
Henn studied psychology at the University of Delaware. He was a member of the class of 2003 at Concord High School in New Castle County, where Debbie Corrado was his tennis coach. She was shocked to learn of his death, but not that he had chosen a career helping child soldiers in Uganda:
"We said, 'Wow, that's really something to take that step.' And I said, 'Well, we're not surprised, are we? It's Nate!' And he would go find something to do to help people."
Corrado says she'll encourage her school to create a lasting memorial to Nate.
Officials believe a Somali militant group with links to al-Qaida could be behind the attacks.
The explosions came two days after a commander with the group called for militants to attack sites in Uganda, a nation that has contributed troops to the African Union peacekeeping force in Somalia.
KYW's Tony Romeo reports that in Selinsgrove, Pa., people have been praying and waiting for more information about the five members of the church group who were injured in the Uganda bombings.
The Christ Community United Methodist Church sits on a bucolic hilltop overlooking farms and fields just outside Selinsgrove, a few miles from the Susquehanna River.
But Rev. Kind, pastor of this church, says members of the group who set out for Uganda in mid-June were not naïve:
"I think they knew the reality that, no matter where we go, that everywhere evil exists. That anywhere something bad can happen. We know that in this country, we know that around the world."
Kind (above, pointing to a church bulletin board) says a mission team from the church has a sister relationship with a congregation in Uganda and makes a trip usually in alternating years. This summer the group was working on a construction project and evangelistic activities.
(Photo #2 by KYW's Tony Romeo)
