Parents were killed in a car crash early on Christmas morning in a remote part of rural Western Australia, leaving their three kids trapped for more than two days in the wreckage.
The children, ages one, two, and five, were discovered by a family member in Kondinin, about 280 kilometers east of the state capital Perth, on Tuesday morning, inside the family's Land Rover Discovery, which had rolled off the roadway, 9News reported.
"If it wasn't for the five-year-old undoing the buckle of the one-year-old's car seat, he wouldn't be with us today," Michael Read, a relative, stated.
The children, already severely dehydrated, were immediately taken to the hospital with severe dehydration.
The mother, Cindy Braddock, 25, and father, Jake Day, 28, however, were declared dead at the scene by the authorities.
5-year-old hero
The family of five had been reported missing a day after Christmas when they were not able to make it to a Christmas Day celebration.
The report stated they were last seen by their loved ones around 1 A.M. on Christmas day as they started a two-hour drive home.
Read narrated that the children were stuck in the vehicle for 55 long hours and in 30-degree heat without anybody knowing what they had been through. He cannot imagine how difficult it must have been for them to be in the car the whole time with their parents dead.
As to the oldest daughter, who has been the sibling's savior, Read expressed that she would not probably know or understand the heroic act she pulled for a few years.
According to CNN News, the kids miraculously survived with non-life-threatening injuries and are expected to be discharged from the hospital in a few more days.
A miracle
A gas station worker in Northam, Nathan O'Donnell, informed ABC that the family stopped by to refuel, go to the toilet and buy snacks, drinks, and other stuff for their travel, shortly after 1 A.M. Sunday.
The worker described the family as looking "very exhausted" as they prepared for their long drive.
Local leaders Darren Pool and Bruce Browning cannot hide their surprise that the car and the kids went unnoticed for days when the car was just on the roadside, People reported.
Pool expressed that with the amount of traffic that has passed the road, it's impossible for the car and the kids not to be seen.
The reason for the vehicular accident is still unclear. However, officials have expressed concerns about the road conditions where the family was traveling, stating that the local roads, especially Wheatbelt, have "dangerous" roads that are "declining in quality."
A GoFundMe campaign has been started to support the parent's funeral costs and their children's living expenses.
A fundraiser believed that an angel was indeed looking over the kids the entire time they were trapped, calling the incident nothing short of a "miracle."
