"One couldn't be without the other. They were each other's yin and yang," said the Cyrs' first-born grandson.
WESTFIELD — Daniel L. and Patricia E. Cyr were a devoted husband and wife on the verge of celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary when they drowned together in Hampton Ponds on Monday.
“It’s hard to take in, but they went together – the way they would have wanted,” said the Cyrs' first-born grandson, Kenneth J. DeJordy, 19, of Westfield. “One couldn’t be without the other. They were each other’s yin and yang.”
The Cyrs' family, gathered at the couple’s Pequot Point Road home of 39 years, shared memories of the husband and wife who lived, and in the end, died for each other.
“My grandmother didn’t usually go out on the boat,” DeJordy added. “I think there was a higher calling.”
Westfield Police Capt. Hipolito Nunez, who described the incident as an accident, said Daniel Cyr, 64, jumped into Hampton Ponds at about 6 p.m. Monday to save their small West Highland terrier puppy, Sadie. As her husband began to struggle, Patricia Cyr, 61, jumped into the water in an attempt to rescue him.
“They were good people, and we’re really a tight-knit family,” DeJordy said while holding Sadie on a leash after removing her from a crate. The dog, he said, was a gift from his great-aunt, Nancy Gauthier, of North Andover, to her brother, Daniel Cyr. They had been planning on breeding the dog.
Sadie, said Miranda S. Landry, the Cyrs’ 35-year-old daughter from West Springfield, will go to Gauthier.
“It would hurt too much for us to take the dog,” she said of herself and her two children, 9 and 6.
Tanya L. Wheeler, the Cyrs’ other daughter who lived across the street from her parents, described her son, DeJordy, as Daniel Cyr’s constant companion.
“From the time he was born he was always by his grandfather’s side,” she said.
DeJordy said Daniel Cyr was “an amazing guy” who hand-built seven wooden pontoon boats, including the one from which he jumped, and added that Patricia Cyr lived to take care of her husband, especially the last 10 years after he lost his sense of smell and taste and sustained minor brain damage from an automobile accident.
“They wouldn’t have wanted to die a slow, lingering death,” he said. “This was not the best timing, but they went together. Now we have to move on and hold onto the memories.”
Two jet-ski riders were credited with pulling the Cyrs from the water and alerting two nearby boaters who transported the husband and wife to shore in separate vessels, police said. Authorities were called to the scene at about 6:23 p.m.
Daniel Cyr was taken to Noble Hospital in Westfield, while Patricia Cyr was transported to Holyoke Medical Center.
State environmental police, investigators from the office of Hampden District Attorney Mark G. Mastroianni, and the state police Crime Scene Services Section assisted Westfield police with the probe. Westfield firefighters and emergency medical technicians also responded.
Monday’s double drowning was the second fatal accident at Hampton Ponds this year. In June, West Springfield resident Nicolae Ulinici, 46, drowned after he entered the water from a boat and never resurfaced, authorities said.