ROXBURY – Oxford County police are investigating the unattended death of a 28-year-old Rumford man, who finished work late Friday afternoon with a coworker at a roofing job in Roxbury Pond Village, then suddenly died after getting into his pickup truck to go home.

Michael L. Carey was pronounced dead at 4:27 p.m. by Med-Care Ambulance paramedic Mike Dixon, investigating Oxford County Cpl. Chancey Libby said at the scene.

“It doesn’t appear to be foul play at all,” Oxford County Sheriff Wayne Gallant said at the scene, where Carey’s red GMC Sierra pickup truck was parked at the Mr. and Mrs. James Wendt camp at 14 Marchard Lane.

Gallant said Carey’s body would be taken by Meader and Sons Funeral Home of Rumford to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Augusta, where an autopsy is expected to be performed Monday to determine the cause of death. It wasn’t readily apparent to investigators, Gallant added.

“There was no doctor tending him, and he wasn’t under any doctor’s care, so we’re calling this an unattended death at this point,” he said.

After Gallant, Libby, Deputy Michael Halacy and county Detective Lt. Hart Daley arrived to examine the truck, area and Carey, Dixon covered the windshield with a white blanket.

Standing between the four police cruisers parked midway down the wet, muddy gravel road, Ray Thomas and Patrick Hamner, both of Rumford, talked in disbelief and shock about the incident, in between interviews with Libby.

“I didn’t know what to think when I was coming up here. He seemed so healthy,” said Hamner, whom Thomas called to the job site after Carey died.

Hamner, who owns Hamner and Nails Roofing and Siding and the apartment in which Carey and his girlfriend, Nichole Jamison, of Rumford live, said he asked Carey if he could work with Thomas to pay off back rent.

Thomas and Carey were repairing one side of the roof at the Wendt camp. The Wendts were at their winter home in Maryland, relative and neighbor Muriel Arsenault said at the scene.

Thomas and Carey started work at 11:30 a.m. and finished around 4 p.m. They had both walked to Roger Elliott’s camp just up the road to wash the roofing tar off their hands, then returned to Carey’s truck, joking with each other, Thomas said.

Elliott watched the men walk back, saw Carey get in behind the wheel, and Thomas on the passenger side and he went back inside.

Arsenault said that after Carey got into the truck and shared a joke with Thomas, he took two breaths and died.

The next thing Elliott knew, Thomas was back.

“I said, ‘What’s wrong?’ and he said, ‘My buddy’s dead,'” Elliott said.

Both men ran to the truck, along with Arsenault, but they couldn’t find a pulse; they couldn’t revive Carey and, they also couldn’t find anyone in the vicinity who knew CPR.

Earlier in the day, Elliott said Carey was complaining of being dizzy and having hot and cold flashes, and had been drinking Gatorade and water by the gallon jug due to the day’s warm temperatures atop the roof.