The girls' father, Brian Trumble, said he was comforted knowing his daughters would be cremated together
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The heartbroken New York father who found his two teenage daughters dead in a car crash after locating them on a tracking app called the tragedy "unreal."
"I don't know what the future holds. Nothing seems right anymore," Brian Trumble told Fox News Digital.
Hailey Trumble, 19, and her sibling, Shelby Trumble, 17, were driving in a Chevy Cobalt on Aug. 1 in Cayuga County when they came over a hill, crossed into the opposing lane and slammed into another vehicle.
Their father became concerned when his daughters failed to answer several text messages after going to a Rochester amusement park with friends.
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Sisters Shelby and Hailey Trumble died in a car accident Aug. 1 after veering into an oncoming jeep on a road in New York. (GoFundMe)
He used a Find My Friends app to pinpoint their location and saw that they were on Ferris Road in nearby Cato.
He then sent another message to Shelby. "Where are you?" he wrote.
"No one knew what to say. It was the worst thing to ever happen to us. I have no words to explain what this loss is like,"
— Brian Trumble told Fox News Digital
He told his girlfriend that the kids were somewhere on Ferris Road – and the words hit her like a brick.
"And she said, 'Oh my God, I heard something happened on Ferris Road,'" he told Fox News Digital.
The father immediately drove to the location, and was stopped by police who were standing at a closed off section of the road.
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Sisters Shelby and Hailey Trumble died in a car crash Aug. 1 in New York State. (Courtesy of Brian Trumble)
The officers told him that two girls had been involved in an accident, and that one had died. He did not know their identities.
"The one police officer stopped me. He didn't want me going down the road. I just sat on my bumper, and I couldn't stand up," Trumble said. "I was just in shock."
He told them he was too distraught to drive home, and one of the officers drove him.
The family was later informed that both Shelby and Hailey were dead.
"No one knew what to say. It was the worst thing to ever happen to us. I have no words to explain what this loss is like," he said.
A local firefighter told the stricken parent that he had remained with Hailey at the crash scene, holding her arm, as her life slipped away.
Shelby and Hailey Trumble died in a car crash Aug. 1 in New York. (Courtesy of Brian Trumble)
The Cayuga County Sheriff's Office confirmed in a press release that the girls had been driving home when they veered into the opposite lane and struck a Jeep Cherokee about 6 p.m. The driver suffered serious injuries but is in stable condition.
"I think they were on a road they'd never been on before, and they just didn't know where they were going and went over a hill too fast," Trumble surmised.
He said the two sisters will be cremated together.
"It does bring some comfort knowing they won't be alone," he explained. "I mean, I wish none of this happened, but at least they'll be together."
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Hailey, he said, graduated from high school last year and was set to begin a job with a local daycare center. Her sister recently began working at a local farm.
Referring to them as "simple country girls at heart," Trumble said the loss has shattered his family.
"They touched so many people," the father said. "Everybody that met 'em just loved them. They're just super sweet and kind and really smart, very smart."
The sisters are survived by their parents, their 21-year-old brother and two stepsisters.
"It's obviously very hard, and we've just been going through pictures and coming across these memories," the grieving father said. "Everyone can sit and laugh and remember all the good times. That is one thing I will say, there were no loose ends. I just wish we had more time with them."
Rebecca Rosenberg is a veteran journalist and book author with a focus on crime and criminal justice. Email tips to
