A 19-year-old from Michigan who was vacationing in the Bahamas was killed when a gigantic wave swept him away as he was hiking. “When they were there, Jonathan also asked Erik if it was okay if he could marry me," Williams says. Jonathan Brussow met his girlfriend, Athena Williams, at a summer party just after they finished the eighth grade. The two bonded the next year as they sat next to each other on the school bus after Brussow moved down the street from Williams. But first, the young man wanted to ask Williams’ family for permission. While the couple was on vacation on the island of Eleuthera in the Bahamas with Williams’ family, Brussow did just that, as he secretly sat them down for a talk when Williams wasn’t around. The person he still is.” 
 
 She says her family is now focusing on returning the help that was given to them by local Bahamians. Jonathan Brussow and Athena Williams Athena Williams 
 
 “Me and Jonathan, we knew we were going to get married. “I’ve never, ever experienced or seen anybody love somebody so genuinely like he actually loved me. “We were creating such a beautiful life together. I knew he wanted to propose to me but I didn’t know he was asking my parents.” 
 
 Just before dawn on March 5, Brussow woke Williams up and told her he was “going to be right back,” and left with Williams’ brother, Eric, for a hike up a nearby cliff to talk with him about the upcoming proposal. “He didn’t come back.” 
 
 As the two men sat at the highest point of the cliff—which Williams says was at least 70 feet high—a freak wave came up and swept the two of them into the water below, leaving them to fight for their survival. Father of Rockford man missing in Bahamas still hopeful, funding effort started 
 
 Brussow was swept into the sea and the other person managed to cling to a rock and pull himself to safety. He had broken ribs and was cut badly but still, he ran a mile to get help for Jonathan before being taken to the hospital. “That’s when we started calling everybody, we called every number possible.” 
 
 In the coming hours, Brussow’s father flew to the island as Williams and her family called the U.S. Embassy, Coast Guard, Ministry of Tourism and anyone else that could assist in the search. Jonathan Brussow and Athena Williams Athena Williams 
 
 “We never stopped searching, we had so much hope,” she says. “If there was one person who could get out of this situation, it’s Jonathan Brussow, and anyone would tell you that.” 
 
 On March 9—four days after the incident—a search party recovered Brussow’s body, hundreds of yards from where the giant wave hit. I couldn’t be more thankful.” 
 
 Athena Williams 
 
 Though the family initially set up a GoFundMe to raise award money for anyone who found Brussow alive, they have now shifted the donation page’s mission. They’d also like to use the donations to purchase warning signs and safety gear that will be available near the island’s Glass Window Bridge—where the wave hit. Williams says they also hope to help the local hospital get new equipment, like a much needed mammogram machine. “I would give anything to be able to have him here and be able to marry him and spend the rest of my life with him.
– "God brought Jonathan in with a storm and took him back in a storm." That's how the family of 19-year-old Jonathan Brussow describe his death earlier this month in the Bahamas, just after he'd asked the family of his girlfriend for permission to marry her. Athena Williams tells People and FOX 17 that the Michigan man she met at a party in middle school was vacationing on the island of Eleuthera with her and her family when, on March 4, he secretly asked her family if he could marry her. Early the next day, Brussow and Williams' brother went for a hike, and as they were resting on a cliff, a wave came out of nowhere and swept the two men into the water below. Williams' brother was badly hurt but managed to get to shore, where he ran for help. Brussow, however, was nowhere to be found, and his family flew out from the US to help Williams, her family, and the locals search for him. On March 9, an 8-foot-deep depression filled with water near where the men were swept away dried up, and Brussow's body was found, MLive.com reports. The $21,000 raised on GoFundMe to help in the search for Brussow—described as the "most beloved kid" on his high school swim team before he graduated in 2016, per WZZM—will now be put toward bringing his body home, offering funds to those who helped look for him, and putting warning signs and safety gear near where the wave took his life. In a statement, his family notes how Brussow had been born in a wild storm on May 31, 1998, and that "those that knew him well knew he lived his life with a storm of passion." As for Williams, she tells People: "I would give anything to be able to have him here and be able to marry him and spend the rest of my life with him. … I wish we had more time." (A rogue wave killed twin sisters in Cabo.)