Philadelphia Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel stood at a podium behind a cherry wood coffin inside the Cathedral Basilica of SS. Peter and Paul on Tuesday and told mourners how Highway Patrol Officer Andy Chan had arrived in the afterlife: on his motorcycle, boots shining, smiling.
Then he turned to the highway patrol officers standing in the front pews. “And how,” he asked, “did Andy Chan announce himself when he arrived at the gates of heaven?”
“Highway!” they answered in unison.
Chan, 55, was laid to rest Tuesday morning, six years after a 79-year-old driver struck his patrol motorcycle near Pennypack Park, catapulting him more than 20 feet away onto the pavement and causing brain injuries from which he never fully recovered.
Chan served 24 years on the Philadelphia police force before the crash on a quiet stretch of Rowland Avenue irrevocably altered the course of his life.
A highway patrol officer for nearly his entire career, Chan spent his working days on two wheels, patrolling neighborhoods and highways astride the bike he was known for riding with pride.
He greeted his fellow officers not with “Hello,” but with “Highway!”
Officers towed Chan’s motorcycle, still bearing his name, in a procession that stretched nearly 18 miles, from North Philadelphia to Center City and finally, to the cathedral.
Inside the gilded building, photos of Chan streamed on TVs: Beside his wife, Teng, dressed in their wedding attire, hands clasped and raised triumphantly as they walked into their reception. In a portrait studio, cradling the youngest of his three children. Standing on the grass of the National Mall in Washington, D.C., surrounded by fellow officers. His arm around a gray-haired Sylvester Stallone. On his bike, over and over again.
Chan had wanted to be a police officer since childhood, he once said in a radio appearance. From his parents’ restaurant in Chinatown, he listened with reverence to the uniformed officers who came in to eat and swap stories with his father. “I kind of looked up to police officers,” he said.
But he was drawn especially to the thunder of their motorcycles as they passed.
After joining the department, Chan spent eight years riding the streets of the 39th District as a bicycle officer before being promoted in 2004 to the department’s elite Highway Patrol Unit.
When he introduced himself to the woman who would become his wife, he did so simply with the words: “I’m Highway.”
Teng Chan described her husband’s “unwavering sense of purpose” as rivaled only by his love of his family. On road trips, she said, he gave long lectures to their eldest son about life, inspiring him to become a volunteer firefighter and later, join the U.S. National Guard, she said.
As for her, his wife said, “He pushed me out of my comfort zone. He made me who I am today: a better person. A fighter.”
After the Jan. 3, 2019, crash, Chan remained in a coma for weeks, reliant on a ventilator. When he awoke, he required 24-hour care from family, friends, and fellow police officers, who regularly sat by his side. Though he could no longer speak, those close to him said he showed recognition and response when loved ones were present.
“We were heartbroken every day after the accident,” Teng Chan said. “We prayed every day for recovery, for him to be restored. With his unbreakable spirit, he stayed with us.
“But,” she said, “it was time. He has a higher calling.”
Chan was buried in Laurel Hill West Cemetery.
