After participating in a soccer match, 24-year-old U.S. Peace Corps volunteer Tessa Horan and a youth swam into the coastal waters of to cool off. As they were treading water, a shark bit Horan on the right thigh and pulled her under the water. She and the youth swam back to shore, screaming for help, but Horan died soon after they reached shore.  Evidently, fatal shark attacks are rare in Tonga, but – obviously – not unheard of…

Being a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer, myself, I was immediately struck by this piece. Of course, no one “deserves” to be attacked by a shark any more than anyone else, but when you consider that, here’s a girl, who’s left her home and family for two years to try to effect a positive change in the world, and then – only two weeks after being placed at her new home – she dies. Imagine Horan’s joy, too, when she opened her Congratulations Letter that explained she had been assigned to an island in the South Pacific. To me, this is such a sad, sad story. My sympathies go out to Horan’s family and friends.