Production consultant Jim Lovell, 58, was headed to Rockefeller Center to prepare for the annual tree lighting when his train careened off the tracks.
The married Cold Spring dad was one of four people killed in the horrifying derailment near the Spuyten Duyvil station.
“He was going to do the lighting for the tree,” Lovell’s longtime neighbor Jonathan Kruk told The Post.
“He loved doing the lighting. He’s been doing that for about 10 years now. He supervises, but he likes to get his hands dirty.’’
Lovell’s wife, Nancy Montgomery, a local councilwoman, “kept saying, ‘Stay here, and let’s celebrate Jim and feel his spirit and help him move on,’ ” Kruk said.
Lovell’s son Finn, 17, one of his four kids, had been planning to practice with his band when the family learned of the crash.
“Everyone please keep my father in your thoughts/prayers,” the teen tweeted. “He’s in the hospital. He was on the train that derailed this morning.’’
An hour later, Finn tweeted again: “I still lack info of my Dads condition. My heart is very heavy. Don’t take anything for granted. Ever.”
Two hours later, he’d received the heartbreaking news. Posting his dad’s photo on Instagram, Finn wrote, “Words can’t express how much my father meant to me. It’s safe to say he molded me into the man I am today. I love you and I miss you. I can’t believe that you’re gone. This feels like an awful nightmare I can’t wake up from. Rest easy dad. I love you.”
The derailment also killed James Ferrari, 59, of Montrose, Donna Smith, 54, of Newburgh, and Ahn Kisook, 35, of Queens.
Smith, a Fishkill paralegal, lived alone, was very close with her sister, Linda, and was deeply involved in her community, a neighbor said.
“She was a wonderful person, just very good,” said Kathy Cerone, 69, noting that the “very spiritual” Smith was active with the Girl Scouts and sang in her church’s choir.
“It just doesn’t seem possible,” Cerone said.
Smith and her sister boarded the train together for the city, where Linda’s choir was to perform Handel’s “Messiah,’’ a relative told The New York Times.
Kisook — the only one of the four not thrown from the train, according to ABC News — was a registered nurse traveling home from a night shift at an Ossining nursing home.
Friends of Ferrari, who was married with a 20-year-old daughter, said the family was too distraught to speak.