Firefighter killed by falling tree on family trip to Biltmore Estate for Father’s Day
The deadly tree limb came out of nowhere, Angela Skudin told Long Island News.
It was just before 4 p.m. on June 17 when she and her husband, Casey Skudin, were driving through the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina, with their children when a tree struck their car, she shared on Instagram.
“It landed right on the car, right on Casey. Everybody was knocked out except me. And I just got through the window, got over to him…his hands were blue,” Angela Skudin told Long Island News. “I held them and I kissed him and just told him the truth that he was the best husband and best father and that it was OK for him to let go. And I slid his wedding ring off his finger and put it on mine.”
The family made the trip because it would have been Casey Skudin’s 46th birthday on Father’s Day, June 19, according to the family’s GoFundMe.
The tree fell due to a windstorm, according to the Citizen Times. Angela Skudin told Long Island News that she and their 19-year-old son escaped the accident with minor injuries and their youngest son was hospitalized.
“You were a noble, brave, damn handsome, smart, responsible man and in my eyes you were it,” Angela Skudin wrote about her husband on Instagram. “All I ever wanted. All I could ever ask for in a partner, lover, father, friend.”
Casey Skudin left marks on many people’s lives outside of his family, too. He was a firefighter with the New York City Fire Department and served 16 years, FDNY spokesperson Jim Long told the Citizen Times. He worked in the Rockaway area of Queens, the outlet reported.
Skudin also took home the Fire Chiefs Association Memorial Medal in 2010 for diving into cold water to rescue a surfer who was trapped underwater, according to the Citizen Times.
“He was a great guy, great fireman, loved his family, loved his job, loved his firehouse. He was a guy you could count on. He’d do anything for you, probably give you the shirt off his back, if he could,” fellow firefighter Joseph Durkin told Long Island News.
Angela Skudin returned to the scene of the accident, she said on Instagram. After she and her father examined the tire marks on the road, she thinks that her husband took quick action to save his family.
“When we were at the site, my father mentioned the skid marks in the road at the time of impact. They showed that my hero husband had the instinct to turn away from the tree and try to position the car for the impact. His quick action as a highly skilled driver saved us and he took the hit… it went down exactly the way Casey would have wanted it to go if it had to happen, and it did,” she wrote on Instagram.
The Skudins’ community teemed with mourning on social media, from fitness clubs, friends, fellow fire departments and triathlon groups.
Angela and Casey Skudin were together for 20 years, according to Angela Skudin’s Instagram page.
“What does grief feel like to me? It feels like my lungs and heart have been taken from my chest and only an empty hole remains,” she wrote.
This story was originally published June 20, 2022 at 4:52 PM with the headline "Firefighter killed by falling tree on family trip to Biltmore Estate for Father’s Day."
