Two Trent University students travelling home to Ottawa for Easter weekend were killed in a car crash on March 28.
Sergeant Natalie McDowell said she was in the communications centre when the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) received a call at 8:44 p.m. informing them that a Honda automobile had collided with a GMC pickup truck on Old Richmond Road near Crooked Side Road.
A coroner pronounced the driver, 21-year-old Maddie Havelock and passenger Thomas Guerette dead at the scene, according to McDowell.
Guerette’s girlfriend, 21-year-old Zoe Murray, was also in the car, and was transported to Carleton Place Hospital with life-threatening injuries, she has since reached stable condition.
McDowell said the cause of the crash is still under investigation, however she could confirm that alcohol and weather conditions have been ruled out as causes.
The car swerved and collided with a truck, and although McDowell said she could neither confirm nor deny witness reports that Havelock was avoiding a deer, it is a possibility.
Two of the truck’s three passengers, who were Perth residents, sustained injuries, according to McDowell. One of the occupants sustained more severe injuries and was later transferred to the Ottawa Civic Hospital.
Carleton University student Emma de Kemp said Havelock, who was her best friend, had driven that route at least 100 times.
Havelock and de Kemp had been friends since middle school, attending St. Joseph’s Catholic High School together for five years. Although the two went to separate universities, de Kemp said the distance did not come between them.
“We were going to get together over the weekend to catch up and watch the latest episode of Chicago Fire. She was going to help me apply for a research trip that we were going to take through Carleton,” de Kemp said.
When de Kemp heard the news early the next morning, she said she could barely read the article through her tears.
“I kept thinking it was a horrible nightmare that would end soon. It wasn’t possible that someone so amazing with such a bright future could be taken so quickly,” she said.
Havelock was a third-year biology and environmental sciences student at Trent University. De Kemp said they both had the same passion for nature and wanted to pursue similar careers, but Havelock was always the better one in science classes.
De Kemp described Havelock as happy, positive, and optimistic.
“I’ve never heard a bad thing about her except that she can’t sing, even though she loves to, and she doesn’t have a volume control,” she said. “These were just quirks that made her unique, and we all loved about her.”
Havelock’s smile was notoriously contagious, according to de Kemp.
Drama teacher Jessica Sutherland, who taught both Guerette and Havelock throughout their time at St. Joseph’s Catholic High School, remembers Havelock as a bright spirit with a big smile.
She described Guerette as loving music, always enjoying being challenged, and participating in class discussions.
“He would be a student who would stay after class to talk more about a topic,” she said.
Sutherland said Guerette was a kid she had always remembered fondly for his kind heart.
“After our first semester together, he took the time to write a thank you letter I still have in my yearbook,” she said.
Many will miss both Guerette and Havelock, Sutherland said.
