The Waterville woman who died after high winds caused a tree branch to fall on top of her car in Farmington Monday morning was an executive chef engaged to be married, who also had hundreds of thousands of followers on social media app TikTok.
Rochelle Hager, 31, died after a branch came down on power lines and snapped a utility pole before landing on the roof of her 2015 Nissan Rogue.
At the time of the crash, she was talking on the phone to her fiancee, Brittanie Lynn Ritchie, who she was set to marry on Oct. 16, the Morning Sentinel reported.
“It happened really quick,” Ritchie told the newspaper. “She has a phone mounted in her vent. I just heard a crash and then there was nothing.”
Hager, who was the only person in the car, most likely was killed instantly, Farmington Police Chief Kenneth Charles told the Lewiston Sun Journal on Monday.
He told the newspaper that the car appeared to have crossed the centerline and came to a rest in the northbound lane after impact, closing down the road for more than two hours.
No other cars were involved, he said.
Ritchie told the Morning Sentinel that Hager moved to Maine in August and was the executive chef at The Woodlands in Waterville, an assisted living facility, and a chef at Amici’s Cucina before that. Hager was also teaching Ritchie’s daughter Jensyn, 9, how to cook.
Mary Carpinito, owner of Amici’s, told the newspaper that Hager was a “sweet” person with a “very nice, positive attitude.”
Together, Ritchie and Hager had more than 400,000 followers on the social networking platform, TikTok. Hager, who went by rouerboat3 on the app, had over 134,500 followers and 1.2 million likes, Newsweek reported.
“We had a following on TikTok, and she was all about positivity and making people laugh,” Ritchie told the Morning Sentinel.
Ritchie posted a video on the platform Tuesday reading “Rest easy my love. I dont know how were going to live life without you [sic]. But we have the best guardian angel to get us through it,” according to Newsweek.
A celebration of life will be held in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where Hager’s parent’s live, and another in Florida where she grew up, Ritchie said.