Phone call keeps Jasper native safe during Paris attacks
Cameron Betz could have easily been in the midst of the horrific attacks in Paris Friday evening.
Instead, a delayed phone conference with his boss and last minute plans for a trip on Saturday kept the Jasper native at his hotel located about 15 miles from the city.
“Normally I am in the vicinity of where the attacks occurred,” Betz, 26, said in an interview Saturday morning. “They [attacks] were in popular areas for food and drinks; especially for younger people.”
Betz graduated from Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology with a bachelor degree in electrical engineering in 2012. He took a position with Valeo Lighting Systems in Seymor, Indiana soon after. Valeo is headquartered in Paris and Betz has been in France since September to complete a masters degree in embedded lighting systems. While attending school, he is staying in a hotel near Versaille about 15 miles from Paris.
His time in France is accented with weekend trips throughout Europe where he enjoys exploring the cultural and historical sites. Believe it or not, although the French cuisine is fantastic, he misses the Mexican cuisine that is so popular around here.
Friday during school, Betz made plans to take an impromptu trip to Brussels, Belgium with a few of his friends. They planned on leaving early Saturday morning but that still gave him time to hang out in Paris Friday evening.
However, he was delayed by a conference call with his stateside boss.
“At the time, I was cursing the situation that I missed out on going out last night because of the conference call with my boss,” Betz said. “In the end, it prevented me from being in the city.”
Saturday, Betz remained holed up in his hotel contemplating the circumstances that may have kept him from experiencing the horrors in the city. Although he feels that things are safe now, he is cautious. The border closing canceled his Belgium trip, and he has decided to stay indoors as the country grapples with a response to the attacks.
“It definitely seems things happen for a reason,” he said referring to his delays Friday night. “Though we often don’t know why or understand why inexplicably bad things like this happen.”
Betz heard about the attacks from his friend Mathieu Drezet, who was in the area when the attacks started. Drezet messaged Betz after hearing the gunshots.
“It was very confusing,” Betz explained. “He [Drezet] was on a bicycle and just fled home as soon as possible. But most people didn’t know what to do because so many different attacks were happening in different locations without any rhyme or reason. They didn’t know whether to stay in their current location or to head home.”
As soon as he received the call from his friend in Paris, Betz posted that he was okay to his Facebook page.
As testimony to how fast information now travels around the world, a friend in the U.S. contacted Betz within moments of the attacks. Unfortunately, Betz’s parents Ron and Lori Betz didn’t see his Facebook status message. They found out he was okay after his mom called him.
At the time of publication, 129 people were confirmed dead (New York Times updates here) and over 350 wounded. The majority of the deaths occurred when gunmen opened fire at about 9 p.m. — 3 p.m. local time — in a crowded concert at a popular venue, the Bataclan, with the American band, Eagles of Death Metal. Attacks occurred in five other areas in the city at around the same time.
Today, police are everywhere in the city as officials look for any co-conspirators in the attacks that have recently been attributed to ISIS. Concerts, public events and cultural sites have been closed.
“It’s just mind-blowing to me still how easily it seems these things can happen. Anywhere,” Betz said. “I definitely feel lucky and fortunate that I wasn’t closer to any of the attacks.”
Betz will be back in the area for Christmas and he will finish his masters in January.
