Fridging is when the character gets unalived so no chance of rescuing.

Fridging refers to when the writer kills usually a partner of the main character to justify the vengeance motivation of the MC, but done in a lazy-writing way basically the partner gets no background nor focus, they are just an object that gets destroyed, like a reverse "McGuffin" if you will. Plus points if the death is done in a crass way, hence the "fridging" (google the origin of the term).

In Fallout 4, the spouse of the MC gets killed gratuitously for no real fucking reason in a crass way "here, you want revenge now", so it checks all the boxes for being a "fridging"

Now, idk if the writers wanted to be "lol so meta" but the spouse gets fridged while sitting in a cryogenic pod.