July 30, 2015 – Elk City, OK
A 25-year-old teacher from the Bronx who was riding a bicycle from Maine to Santa Barbara, CA to raise awareness for education, was hit and killed by a
driver yesterday who was looking at her phone.
Patrick Wanninkhof, 25, was hit while riding on Highway 152 south of Elk City at 8:05 a.m. on Thursday, July 30, 2015, according to the Oklahoma Highway Patrol. He died at the scene.
He was riding with Bridget Anderson, 22, who was also hit by the driver, and was airlifted to OU Medical Center with a leg injury. Her condition has been listed as stable according to Highway Patrol. Both cyclists were riding for the program Bike&Build which seeks to “pedal for affordable housing.”
The two cyclists were riding west when a westbound 2014 Chevy driven by Sarah Morris, 34, of Cordell, OK hit them. She was distracted by looking at her phone when she struck them, according to the OHP report. There was no information on whether the driver would be cited, and Morris was not hurt in the crash.
Wanninkhof was originally from Key Biscayne, FL., and had graduated summa cum laude from the University of Florida in 2012. He was teaching Physics and Computer Science at Fordham High School in the Bronx. He also earned his Masters in Teaching Adolescent Physics from Fordham University in 2014.
On his webpage of Bike&Build, he wrote:
A group shot with Patrick Wanninkhof in an undated photo with his fellow Bike&Build members.
“I was thrust into the education with little background on the systemic inequities which limit my students. The middle-class ideal of meritocracy instilled me with the misguided belief that all my students needed to do was work harder and success would follow. This mindset was soon challenged when a student told me that she and her mom had been moving between relatives houses every week after they couldn’t pay rent…To fix systemic inequities which burden our nation, we need a systemic approach to fighting poverty. Education reform will be fruitless if we cannot guarantee that every child can return to a safe home in the evening.”
Outside of his passion for education he said he was an avid bicyclist and had completed the New York Century Ride in 2014 with his dad and sister. He
Patrick Wanninkhof –freedom on a bicycle in earlier days.
also loved getting out of the hustle and bustle of New York City, he wrote.
“As someone with a Dutch father, bicycling is in my blood. Combining my passion for social justice and pedal powered-vehicles will make for the adventure of a life-time.”
On the bottom of his fundraising page on Bike&Build Patrick had raised 176% of his goal or $7,913 out of his $4,500 goal.
A Sarah Morris of Cordell, OK, was pictured in a recent photograph as part of a medical “brigade” going to isolated communities in eastern Panama to deliver supplies on behalf of a group from the Southwestern Oklahoma State University.