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Couple expecting first child killed near where brother died
By MIKE D'AMOUR, CALGARY SUN
Tragedy haunts Calgary family
It's a tragedy almost too horrible to imagine: A young couple -- expecting their first child -- killed in a traffic collision after visiting a site where a family member died in a similar crash.
Northeast Calgary residents Jeremy and Maria Fisher, both 28, had just finished their Cochrane ice cream cones Sunday afternoon and were on their way back from visiting the site where Jeremy's brother, Andrew Fisher, was killed in a 2001 car collision.
With Jeremy driving the couple's 2002 Mazda Protege eastbound on Hwy. 1A, about 8 km west of Cochrane, the car inexplicably veered into the oncoming lane and hit a British military bus head-on that was travelling to CFB Suffield.
Jeremy and Maria -- who was seven weeks pregnant -- were both killed instantly.
"This is just too horrible, too horrible to even imagine," said Maria's brother, John Ferrise, who sat with other family members in his mother's northeast home yesterday in an attempt to come to terms with the terrible loss.
Jeremy and Maria met about four years ago through friends and Ferrise said the connection between the two was immediate.
"It was love at first sight," he said.
The couple dated for a year before they married. They were set to celebrate their third anniversary July 6.
Jeremy, a construction worker, and Maria, an instructor who taught hairstyling, had been trying for the past two years to have a baby.
They were thrilled at the prospect of having their first child, friends said.
"They were absolutely elated," recalled pal Mike Wood, who was the best man at the couple's wedding.
The couple was just out for a lazy Sunday -- ice cream in Cochrane, then a visit to the site where Jeremy's brother and five other teens were killed in a 2001 collision.
"They would often go and visit that site," said Ferrise.
"I'm sure that's what they were doing on Sunday."
The distance between the two collisions was less than 5 km on the same stretch of road.
Police yesterday were trying to piece together what happened in Sunday's crash.
The military bus -- which contained two riders, neither of whom were severely injured -- and the Fisher's small car were both travelling the speed limit when the crash occurred, police said.
Witnesses described the collision as horrific and said the car almost disintegrated on impact.
Cochrane RCMP said road conditions were ideal at the time of the tragedy and alcohol is not suspected as being a factor in the crash.
Police are continuing their investigation.
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