Blue Jackets Fans Travel To The Roadside Memorial In New Jersey To Pay Respects To The Gaudreau Brothers

When Jim Ketchel and his wife Brenda left Columbus for Pottstown, PA for a car show last week, they had no idea they would end up being so close to the site where Johnny and Matthew Gaudreau would be tragically cut down at the hands of an alleged drunk driver. 

The day one Blue Jackets fans decided early in their drive to visit the site. "We were about halfway here when we heard the news, and we kind of decided impromptu that we would visit the crash site," Ketchel says. 

Being only 90 minutes or so from Salem County, New Jersey, the choice for the Ketchel's was easy, "We will visit and try to get a sense of why and how. We got the how figured out, but the why is something we might never know," Jim says. He goes on to say, "We felt like we needed to make the effort to visit since we weren't there to do anything special at Nationwide."

The choice was easy, so they went. "We felt we had to do it. We were so close, and so many others were so far away," said Jim. 

The Ketchels spent nearly 30 minutes at the memorial site. "We intended to spend about 10 minutes, but we forgot to be objective and got lost in the moment," he says. 

When asked to describe the area, Jim described it as a "pitch black, lightly traveled, narrow road with lots of bugs." He also said the road was "nowhere near being wide enough for cars to pass each other." 

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Brenda described being at the scene as "Very surreal with overwhelming sadness."

I asked Jim to describe what he felt being at the scene, he said "The word I keep feeling is senseless. You just can't wrap your head around why these men aren't here anymore."

"It's like I'm in a play about an unspeakable tragedy, only I have to speak," says Jim about the fact that Johnny Gaudreau is gone.

Only one other car stopped by last night when the Ketchels were there. It was dark and was right around the same time the incident happened on Thursday night, which made it even more surreal for the couple. 

Even three days later, it just doesn't seem real. No amount of tribute videos, news reports, or articles will ever make me think this actually happened. 

How does his family move on? Can they even? How does the franchise move on? 

There is no word yet on when the Gaudreau Brothers will have their funeral services, but when it happens, maybe that's when it'll finally sink in. 

Did you visit the memorial at NWA? How did you feel when you were there?  Please share your thoughts on our forum.

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