Dorota Rynkiewicz: 1981-2016
After the long-delayed inquest opened yesterday into the deaths of seven passengers on a Croydon tram in a derailment at Sandilands in November 2016, today was spent with family members of those who died reading prepared statements – pen portraits – to described their lost loved ones.
The pen portrait of Dorota Rynkiewicz was read to the inquest by her husband, Andrzej
Dorota was born on 30 April 1981 in Elbląg in Poland.
She did well at school and ended up getting a scholarship to study Economics and Accounting at the University of Poland in Elbląg from 2000 to 2003.
She passed her degree with top marks.
Dorota was very ambitious and I always knew she would do well in her career.
Dorota and I met at university and eventually married on Christmas Day in 2005.
Dorota was an amazing wife. She was so supportive of me and my golf career. We supported each other’s ambitions completely.
We decided to move to the UK once Dorota had finished university in 2003.
She started off working in clothes shops, but not before long she started to work for the SSP Group, at the Millies Cookies in Victoria Station.
Dorota worked really hard. I remember thinking she was working too hard but Dorota was always ambitious and striving to do better.
Within four months of starting at Millies she had been promoted to Assistant Manager.
Dorota took maternity leave to have our eldest daughter, and then a year after she returned to work she was promoted to Unit Manager of the Victoria Station branch of Millies Cookies.
Our first daughter, Nicole, was born on 13 October 2009. Becoming a family was the happiest time for us. She took a full year off on maternity leave and she stepped into the role of a mother so well.
Our youngest daughter, Maya, was born on 1st March 2011.
Dorota returned to work and juggled being a mother with her aspirations to continue progressing in her career. As well as working hard she was a wonderful mother to our girls.
When the tram crash happened on 9 November 2016, Dorota was on her way to work at Victoria Station.
Our beautiful daughters were seven and five years old at the time.
Having to tell them about the crash was awful.
Not a day goes by when the girls and I don’t miss her terribly.
Read more: No one to blame. Or no one cares? Tram crash case dropped
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Read more: Driver of crashed tram ‘too unwell’ to give evidence at inquest
Read more: TfL considered cancelling tram contract after 2016 crash
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