The TV presenter Phil Spencer has said his parents “would have held hands” after their car crashed into a river on their farm.
The Location, Location, Location presenter paid an emotional tribute to Anne and David Spencer on Instagram after the accident on Friday.
In a post, Spencer, 53, revealed the pair had been on their way to lunch when their car toppled off a bridge and into a river in Littlebourne, Kent.
“Very sadly both of my amazing parents died on Friday,” he wrote. “As a family we are all trying to hold on to the fact Mum and Dad went together and that neither will ever have to mourn the loss of the other one. Which is a blessing in itself.”
He told his followers that they “would have held hands under the water and quietly slipped away”.
He added that both were “on extremely good form” in the days before the accident, but that his mother’s Parkinson’s and father’s dementia had been “worsening”.
“So much so that mum said to me only a week ago that she had resigned to thinking ‘now it looks like we will probably go together’. And so they did.
“It feels horrendous right now, but after almost 60 years of marriage, to die together on the farm they so loved will, I know, be a comfort in the future.”
Spencer said there were “no physical injuries” but doubted “they would have even fought it”.
He added that their carer, who was also in the car, managed to climb out of a back window and raise the alarm to Spencer’s brother.
“As many farmers do, my brother had a penknife and so was able to cut the seatbelts. He pulled them out of the river but they never regained consciousness.”
Kent fire and rescue service confirmed it was called at 12.38pm on Friday and spent 90 minutes at the scene.
Their deaths were first announced by Spencer’s co-star on the Channel 4 show, Kirstie Allsopp, on Saturday evening.
Alongside a photo of the couple – who had eight grandchildren, Allsopp described them as “farmers, animal lovers and devoted parents”.
“The only blessing is that they died together, so will never have to mourn the loss of each other,” she added.
The presenter, who has worked on the property show with Spencer since 2000, asked followers to keep him and his family in their “thoughts and prayers”.
