Jamie Lapierre: His best friend's story

When Jamie Lapierre walked into a room, he filled it. 

"He was a loud guy. When Jamie walked into the room, he was the centre of attention - just the persona of him, the way he carried himself," remembers Roger Hudson, his lifelong friend. "He lived on the edge. But when he was at work, he took it seriously."

So when Lapierre fell silent while working in the hold of a Port Hawkesbury barge during a maintenance shift in February 2000, his co-workers soon noticed. The first man who went into the hold to check on Jamie nearly died from a lack of oxygen caused by rust, the same thing that had killed Lapierre.

Jamie Lapierre's death shocked and devastated his family and friends. "We were talking a week prior," remembers Roger. "Jamie had been working in Cape Breton and came home on the weekends. The last conversation we had was Sunday evening when he was heading back to Port Hawkesbury. He said, 'I'll see you Friday,'" Roger recalls. "I did see him Friday, but it was at his wake."

Losing his best friend changed Roger’s outlook. He asked a lot more questions on job sites and stayed vigilant for dangerous situations. He started working in construction, became a journeyman gas fitter, and retrained as a safety advisor.

"Jamie's death still affects me. It's kind of determined my career path. Every day, I'm on work sites looking after people's safety," Hudson says. "How I try to do my work out here, it's because of the loss."

Jamie Lapierre lived for 21 years, and died 25 years ago, but he makes the world safer today through the work of his friend. "He's still a force. Not the force he was when he was with us, but he's still capturing people's attention. It's a positive out of a negative for sure. He's still gripping people. He's still in people's lives," Hudson says. "I think he'd be very humbled by it."

Last updated March 2025

Back to Jamie's Story