Volunteer Lyndeborough firefighter Derek Lankowski was a laid-back guy who relished riding his motorcycle and shooting guns with friends.
Those are just some of the things his friend and fellow firefighter Kevin Berkebile remembered about him.
“Never had anything bad to say, he was always caring, easy going,” Berkebile told the Monitor on Wednesday. “He was just laid back.”
Lankowski, 31, was killed Tuesday when the wind blew down a tree, crushing the cab of his gray Chevy truck on North Stark Highway in Weare.
Berkebile, the deputy fire chief in Lyndeborough, said his friendship with Lankowski was beyond the walls of the firehouse. It was a bond that stretched back to when they were teenagers.
Both had an interest in motorcycles and cars – Berkebile worked at an auto parts store, Lankowski at a tire shop.
“We crossed paths quite a bit,” said Berkebile, 28.
As they grew older, they kept in touch and stuck to their roots. They rode motorcyles around town and ventured out onto the backroads.
Both had an interest in helping people: Berkebile joined the department 12 years ago, and Lankowski followed four years later.
“We lost a firefighter, friend, and a family member due to a freak accident,” Berkebile posted on the department’s Facebook page. “He was the type of guy that would do anything for anyone.”
On Wednesday, Berkebile and other members of the fire department escorted Lankowski’s body from Goffstown to a funeral home in Jaffrey.
Berkebile said arrangements for the services are being made and information will be posted on the department’s Facebook page.
The Telegraph reported that Lankowski and his wife, Melissa Alexander, were getting ready to celebrate their 3½-year wedding anniversary this week.
Lankowski was passing the entrance to John Stark Regional High School about 2:40 p.m. Tuesday when a gust of wind brought down a tree on the west side of the road.
The poplar tree was heavy enough to crush the cab of his Chevy 2500 pickup truck. There were no passengers.
Two witnesses – one a passer-by and another, Lesa Phipps, who lives across the street from the high school – rushed to the truck while others called for help.
Phipps said Lankowski was still alive when they got to him, but he was disoriented and couldn’t communicate.
Wind gusts ripped through Merrimack County on Tuesday, reaching speeds as high as 46 mph in the early morning. Gusts reached 42 mph about the time of the crash, according to the National Weather Service in Gray, Maine.
Weare police Chief Sean Kelly said the tree was not on property owned by the town or state.
Bill Boynton, a spokesman for the Department of Transportation, said it’s not uncommon for trees to fall onto roadways in heavy wind or during snowstorms.
“It’s very rare to have what happened (Tuesday),” he said.
Boynton could only recall a similar accident in 2010 when a large pine tree fell on a car traveling on Interstate 93 in Manchester. A man was killed, and his wife and child suffered serious injuries. That day saw heavy rain and high winds, according to the Associated Press.
In July, WMUR reported that a 24-year-old man was killed driving in Claremont when a tree came down on his car during a period of strong winds.
(Nick Stoico can be reached at 369-3314, nstoico@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @NickStoico.)