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Port Coquitlam City Hall will be glowing blue and green tonight, Jan. 8, to honour a local family killed in a 2020 plane crash in Iran.
Ardalan Ebnoddin-Hamidi, his wife, Niloofar Razzaghi, and their 15-year-old son, Kamyar Ebnoddin-Hamidi, were among 176 people aboard Ukraine International Airlines Flight PS752 just minutes after it took off from Tehran Imanm Khomeini International Airport.
The Beoing 737 jet, en route to Kyiv, Ukraine, was shot down by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
The Port Coquitlam family was making its way home after spending the Christmas holidays with family.
Ardalan Ebnoddin-Hamidi was an engineer who worked on the Evergreen Line tunnel and other major infrastructure projects around Metro Vancouver. He also helped coach his son’s soccer team.
Niloofar Razzaghi was a teacher and Kamyar was a French Immersion student at Riverside Secondary.
Their deaths, among 63 Canadians killed in the crash, sparked sadness and anger in the local Iranian community, where the Hamidi family was actively involved in organizing all-candidate meetings during elections.
A candlelight vigil was held at Coquitlam’s Spirit Square Park and teams in the Coquitlam Metro Ford Soccer organization prefaced their home matches with a minute of silence to remember the family. Students at Riverside also wore red for a day, Kamyar’s favourite colour.
But the community’s grief was quickly overshadowed by anger at the circumstances of the crash.
Complicated by the onset of public health restrictions brought on by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Razzaghi’s brother, Babak, told the Tri-City News their family’s anger and frustration was palpable.
“There’s no point,” he said of the investigation into the crash and the desire for answers. “Another day, something about a black box and we’re all crying.”
A year later, friends and relatives of crash victims were still struggling to understand what happened and who would be held to account.
“This is a crime against humanity,” said Fred Soofi, a retired restaurateur and prominent member of the local Persian community who helped raise money to fund a legal battle for the families of the crash’s victims.
“It has to be tried in the International Court of Justice.”
In a statement on its Facebook page, the City of Port Coquitlam said the lighting of City Hall is a simple act of remembrance for a beloved local family that returned that love to their community.
“The Hamidi family enjoyed being involved in the community — helping with elections, attending summer camps with the city, being a friendly face and getting to know neighbours."
With files from Stefan Labbé, Glacier Media
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