Yesterday, I had the unfortunate job of reporting on a car accident in Brookline, New Hampshire where a volunteer firefighter was one of the first responders on the scene of a car wreck that killed his daughter Tuesday morning.
Investigators say that 30-year-old Katie Hamilton was killed after her SUV was rear-ended into the path of oncoming traffic where she was struck by another vehicle traveling in the opposite direction. The accident occurred directly in front of the town’s safety complex, where the ambulance and other emergency operations are located and only a few hundred feet from the home she grew up in.
Hamilton’s father, Stephen Whitcomb told the Nashua Telegraph that he worked with his daughter at a plumbing business when not volunteering with the fire department. As one of the first responders on the scene, Whitcomb actually pulled his daughter from the vehicle without knowing it was her. She was pronounced dead on the scene.
“It’s a sad, sad day for all of us, not just because it’s Christmas Eve, but because of the relationship of the deceased,” Brookline Police Chief Bill Quigley told WMUR-TV Tuesday. The Telegraph reported that Hamilton was married and a mother of three children.
Authorities say Hamilton was either stopping or slowing down to make a left turn when her SUV was rear-ended by a truck driven by 31-year-old Greg Cullen. The crash knocked the SUV into the opposite land, where it was struck by another pickup truck driven by James Ciprotti, 37. Investigators are still trying to determine why Cullen read-ended Hamilton’s SUV and no charges have yet been filed.
“At the last minute – we don’t know if it was driver distraction or what the cause was, we haven’t been able to determine that – he swerved to avoid hitting her and still struck her on the very right rear corner of her vehicle,” Quigley said.
Whitcomb described his daughter as an outspoken person who wasn’t afraid to voice her opinions. “You grieve,” Whitcomb told the Nashua Telegraph, “and then you try to put it all back together.”
We ask for everyone to lift this family, and all those involved in this tragic situation, up in prayer.
To read my initial report on this tragic accident, click here: https://fggam.org/new-hampshire-volunteer-firefighter-finds-daughter-in-fatal-christmas-eve-crash/