Pastor Marries Two Killed in Crash

A young pilot and his fiancee, killed last week in a plane crash, were married at graveside by a pastor who testified to their love and religious devotion.

The Rev. Rayburn Blair said Mike Ellis, 27, and Toni Goff, 23, had pledged their lives to one another and had planned to marry in April.

“I’m perfectly at ease in performing this ceremony of holy matrimony,” Blair said during the service Monday, when they were buried side by side.

“Because I heard them already say yes . . . I testify for them that they accept each other as partners in this holy estate and are united not just in life, but for all eternity, as brothers and sisters in Christ.”

On Oct. 22, the couple had met with Blair, who is pastor of Temple Baptist Church, for a premarital counseling session.

“Arm in arm, they left,” Blair told about 350 mourners. “I could see a beautiful young couple that was going to succeed in life.”

Fifteen days later, on Nov. 6, the two died when their rented single-engine Cessna 152, which Ellis had been certified to fly a week earlier, plunged into a pine forest south of Tallahassee. They were flying to a dinner date at Cedar Key, on the coast 115 miles to the southeast.

The minister said Tuesday he performed the ceremony at the family’s request, and had not heard of such a thing being done before.