When more than one million people applied to volunteer at the FIFA World Cup 2026, one name was confirmed first above all others: Nancy Tituaña Morales, an Ecuador-born New Yorker whose path to that moment wound through tragedy, pain, and an extraordinary will to rebuild.
A life shaped by football and family
Tituaña grew up in Ecuador with football at the centre of her world. Her father took her to watch LDU Quito and Deportivo Cuenca, and together they celebrated when Ecuador qualified for the FIFA World Cup for the first time in 2001. She trained as a nurse in Ecuador before emigrating to the United States, where she had to start over entirely.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, she channelled her energy into community service, co-founding Brigada de Esperanza NYC — a non-profit that now supports hundreds of New York City families every week. It was that same spirit of giving that put her in harm's way.
The accident that changed everything
On 24 June 2020, while delivering food to a family in Queens affected by COVID-19, Tituaña opened the trunk of her parked car when a drunk driver struck it, pinning her between two vehicles. She remembers nothing of what followed until she woke 50 days later, surrounded by machines.
