Airline Ticket Refund

We are a family of 5 from Florida who purchased 5 tickets Orlando to New York on Usair for the Thanksgiving Holidays. When the Rockaway crash happened one week before our departure we decided not to put our entire family on a plane at that time. We know "flying is safer than driving", but in this day and time, we were too uncomfortable to get on a plane. (Our oldest daughter is very neurotic about the events of the 11th and is presently seeing a therapist - we had just talked her into flying again, when the Rockaway crash happened - she refused to fly after that) Our tickets, of course, were non-refundable. However, we are requesting full refund due to the events of the last few months. We have requested, in writing, that USAir refund our tickets but they will only offer to hold them for 2 years at a cost of $100 per ticket. This renders the tickets worth $29 each. Do we have any recourse? These tickets are worth almost $650 and for a family of 5 that's hard to swallow. Please advise if we should drop the issue or if there is a venue to help us recover our losses.
Thanks.