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Cassie Moore
 The untimely death of 16 year-old Cassie Moore left a deep void at Chattanooga, Tennessee’s Notre Dame High School. Lonely for her, friends posted letters to her and prayers for her on the school’s web site for months. They kept her locker decorated with letters, cartoons, tributes and cards for the remainder of the school year after her death in January. They still remember her with love and hurt.
Cassie was smart, funny, compassionate and gentle, a girl who was loved and respected by both teachers and students. She was deeply spiritual and very active in her church and its youth activities. At school, she excelled in her classes and took part in a wide range of school activities, honor clubs and student leadership groups. “Cassie took every day as a challenge to learn and grow, and she shared her loving personality with everyone who crossed her path,” says her father, Bob Moore.
On her way back from a movie with friends just after midnight on Sunday, January 27, 2002, Cassie was barely a mile from home and stopped at a traffic light when her car was hit by a pickup. The impact of the crash sent Cassie’s Honda 30 feet off the roadway and into a tree. The 18 year-old driver of the truck told traffic investigators that the light was yellow and he was trying to get through the intersection before it changed to red when the crash occurred. Cassie was airlifted to a local hospital where she died the next afternoon as a result of her massive injuries.
Cassie’s family believes that driver’s awareness programs should be the concern of the entire community. “If people don’t have a 15 or 16 year-old driver, they think this doesn’t affect them,” says her father. “But kids are on the road where they come into contact with thousands of drivers. They’re making decisions every few seconds that could alter somebody’s life forever. It is an awesome responsibility and they must be fully trained. Everyone who is a licensed driver has a stake in making it happen.”
In November of 2002, Notre Dame dedicated a memorial garden at the school to Cassie and the three other students who had died in car accidents in an 18-month period. At the dedication, Cassie’s brother, Michael, read a letter he had written to his sister after her death that read, in part: “I guess God needed an angel on that late night and thought you were perfect for the job. I guess he was right.”
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