William Finn, a state trooper and a spokesman with the Washington State Patrol, was tweeting Wednesday under the name @wspd5pio about a fatal collision that occurred on Vancouver's Interstate 205. A Twitter follower of Finn's began to worry that her husband was the victim.

The car involved in the crash was traveling northbound on the highway when it crossed the median into the southbound lane, hitting a pickup truck head on. Finn, who usually tweets when accidents occur on the interstate, tweeted news of the accident at 2:11 p.m., according to CNN.

He wrote, "Vancouver - SB 205 @ Padden - Fatality collision. WB Padden to SB 205 is closed. Right lane SB 205 also closed in area. Use alt route!"

Ten minutes later, Caran Johnson, a monitor of police scanners and a local Twitter follower of Finn's, had just learned about the accident, NBC News reports. "this accident sounds horrible," she tweeted at 2:01 p.m. PST under the handle @ScanCouver. 

Finn, who was gathering information at the scene, eventually found out that the car was a 2005 Hyundai Elantra, and the driver inside had died at the scene.

Johnson reached out to Finn when she could not contact her husband, who drives on that route. She had tweeted him many times before to find out about an accident.

"I may tweet something and she may tweet back. One night we exchanged a recipe for a low carb pizza," said Finn, even though they had never met.

At 2:17 p.m., Johnson wrote, "I'm trying not to panic, but my husband left work early and he drives 205 to get home. he's not answering his phone."

At 2:20 p.m., Johnson tweeted to Finn, "@wspd5pio do you have descriptions of involved vehicles?"

"@ScanCouver sorry. Not yet.," Finn replied.

"It was terrible," the spokesman later said. "Immediately, I went into overdrive mode and I stopped tweeting the whole thing. I didn't want someone to find out over Twitter that their husband passed away. I didn't want her to find out that way. That is a hard thing to go through," he said.

While Finn normally tweets photos of crash scenes, he did not tweet a photo on Wednesday.

"I didn't put a picture on Twitter just in case that was her husband," he said.

Johnson soon found out that it was her husband who had died in the crash. At 3:50 p.m., Finn released a tweet confirming the tragic news. "it's him. he died," she posted on the site.

Johnson's husband, Craig, 47, was the only casualty in the accident, which is under investigation.

A woman driving another car involved in the incident was taken to a hospital with a broken femur and a collapsed lung.

"I feel terrible. I still feel terrible," Finn said. "Our hearts go out to the family. This person was a member of our community and we just lost him."