Brothers died trying to save father from fumes in backyard shed
Broken Hill is a town in mourning after the deaths of a father and his two sons in an unthinkable tragedy.
Two young brothers gave their lives trying to pull their unconscious father free from a cellar below a shed.
He had collapsed after inhaling toxic fumes, which soon overcame his sons as well.
Father Layne Harvey, 44, and sons Jakeb, 23, and Kurtis, 16, all died.
Jakeb was also father to a young child.
Kurtis was described by family friend Maddison “loving, caring, always there for everyone”.
Together, she said, the brothers were the definition of “ride together, die together”.
According to authorities, a manhole in the shed led to a small cellar that houses a generator or pump that apparently gave off the deadly fumes.
Layne’s distraught wife raised the alarm.
“She had to get out because she couldn’t stand the smell, she started to respirate herself and couldn’t breathe,” neighbour Margaret Graham said.
“So she’s rung the boys and they’ve come down and tried to get dad out, and they all got caught in the cellar.”
Despite the best efforts of paramedics, all three later died in hospital.
“That’s the type of family they are, they would have jumped straight down there to try and help him out,” family friend Jack Burke said.
Exactly what the cellar is used for is unclear. Even some of the family’s closest friends had no idea it was there.
The entrance measures about 30 by 30 centimetres – only just big enough to squeeze through – so access for the first responders was extremely difficult.
“The fumes were very overcoming even for us as paramedics,” NSW Ambulance inspector Lisa Darley said.
“We had to retreat.”
Twenty-fours later it was still too dangerous for investigators to enter the cellar because of the fumes.
On Friday afternoon, firefighters tried to clear the air using an extraction device from one of the local mines but that attempt was not successful.
A specialist confined-spaces team from Sydney is expected to arrive on Saturday to help with the investigation into what caused the tragedy.
