Samya Stumo and Mick Ryan: How Did They Die?

Boeing has faced several accidents involving its aircraft, leaving families devastated and raising questions about aviation safety. One such tragedy was the Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 crash in March 2019, in which 157 people lost their lives, including Samya Stumo and Mick Ryan. Netflix’s ‘Freefall: A Reckoning for Boeing’ features interviews with their family members, who spoke about the tragedy, the sudden loss of their loved ones and the aftermath they were left to navigate. Their stories added a personal dimension to the wider questions surrounding the Boeing crashes and their consequences.

Samya Stumo Was Going to Her First Work Assignment When the Flight Crashed

Samya Stumo was born on June 29, 1994, to Michael Stumo and Nadia Milleron. She and her brothers, Adnaan and Tor, lived in Winsted, Connecticut, for a while. In 1998, after Samya’s other brother, Nels, passed away, the family moved. Samya was largely homeschooled and had a very quaint life living on the farm. There were pigs and farm equipment that kept her busy, but she was also academically gifted. Samya was in eighth grade when she joined public school, and at just 14, she enrolled at Mary Baldwin College. She spent her final year of high school in Peru as part of the Rotary Youth Exchange, where she developed a strong interest in anthropology and global healthcare.

She later joined the University of Massachusetts Amherst to major in anthropology and Spanish. Extracurricular activities always interested her, and she went on to become a Residential Assistant, President of the Anthropology Undergraduate Club and a mentor for the Rotary Youth Club, among other roles. She received several awards, including the Salute to Service Scholarship and the Robert C. and Margaret A. Cole Undergraduate Research Award. Samya returned to Peru for a summer, conducting field research in the high Andes community of Nunoa, which became the basis of her thesis.

She later presented her research at an American Anthropological Association conference. In 2015, she graduated with flying colors and received a full scholarship to attend the University of Copenhagen’s Global Health Master’s Program. She also interned at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health and completed her master’s in 2018. By 2019, she had joined ThinkWell as an analyst, working to increase access to healthcare in Asian and African communities. On March 10, she boarded a flight from Ethiopia to Kenya for her very first field assignment when the aircraft crashed.

Mick Ryan Was on a Humanitarian Mission With the WFP When He Passed Away

Micheál “Mick” Ryan was born on March 28, 1980, in Lahinch, Ireland. His parents, Christina and Jack, were working-class people, with his mother working as a teacher and his father as an accountant. They raised Mick and his three siblings, Cristin, Siobhán and Tiernan, in a fairly normal household, but Mick went on to build an impressive career for himself. He worked with the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) as Global Deputy Chief Engineer within the agency’s Engineering Division. He had also found love with Naoise Connolly Ryan and had settled in Rome, Italy, where he mostly worked from the WFP headquarters. Mick was involved in several humanitarian efforts, including the 2014 Nepal earthquake relief operation, the 2014–16 Ebola outbreak response in Liberia and work supporting Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh.

In 2016, he and Naoise welcomed their daughter, Saorlaith, followed by their son, MacDara, in late 2018. On March 10, 2019, Mick was traveling to Nairobi as part of a group of WFP aid specialists heading to the UN Environment Assembly when Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 crashed. His remains were not immediately recovered, and his family held a memorial service for him in August 2019. In October of that year, his remains were identified through DNA, and he was laid to rest in a private family funeral at Ennistymon New Cemetery on October 29, 2019. In 2020, the WFP posthumously appointed him Chief Engineer, and he was also named Humanitarian of the Year by the Irish Red Cross. He has continued to be remembered for his humanitarian work, while his family has continued to advocate for better aviation safety and accountability from Boeing.

Read More: Lamar Odom’s Parents: How Did They Die?