Missing mother and two children found dead after their car plunged off a 300ft cliff into the ocean
A loving and devoted mother and her two young children were reportedly killed after their people carrier fell off a 300ft cliff into the ocean below.
The mother, 35-year-old Heidi Scheepers, her six-year-old daughter Cuzette and two-year-old son Hugo died instantly when their VW Caravelle first smashed into a rock and then vanished into the waves.
A large manhunt had been launched by authorities in South Africa to find the missing trio. The family was reported missing when they did not return home from a walk on the beach to have dinner with their father.
Scheepers' husband, 36-year-old Ettienne, had spent all of Tuesday afternoon with his wife and children on the beach next to Herolds Bay before the tragedy had occurred.
The family had parted ways when Ettienne went to check on some properties that they managed in the resort while Scheepers took the children to the car park to drive them home. When Etienne returned to their home at around 7 pm, there were no signs of the family.
The family's home is a short drive from the clifftop car park where the family VW was found missing.
According to a Mirror report, a source for the South African Police shared, "Below the point where the tire tracks left the road and on rocks right by the sea below there was some wreckage from the missing VW Caravelle."
"A helicopter was called in along with the coastguard and divers and then we brought in climbers to abseil down the cliff but it appeared that the car itself had been completely submerged," the source said.
A"t low tide, a tyre was seen so we knew where the wreckage was but the sea was very rough and it was getting dark so we called off the operation until Thursday morning at dawn," the source added.
On Thursday, October 24, afternoon, the body of Hugo was discovered strapped into his car seat. On Friday morning the divers were called in to look for the bodies of Scheepers and Cuzette at the next low tide. Etienne was believed to be "inconsolable".
Accident investigators are hoping to be able to recover the VW to understand how the car had driven off the edge.