Australia landslide: Tributes paid to UK family after deaths in Blue Mountains

Mehrab Nazir was hiking with his family in the Blue Mountains when they were caught in a landslide, killing him and his younger son

Tributes have been paid to a British lawyer who died in a landslide with his nine-year-old son while hiking in Australia's Blue Mountains.

Mehraab Nazir, 49, died with his son at the scene. His wife, Anastasia, remains in a critical condition while another son, aged 14, is stable after surgery.

Mr Nazir was a partner at a law firm working in Singapore, where his family moved more than a decade ago.

His firm said he was a "dear friend and colleague".

Watson Farley & Williams said they would be "remembering and honouring" him.

The alarm was raised on Monday afternoon by the family's 15-year-old daughter after the landslide killed her father and younger brother, leaving her mother and older brother critically injured.

The teenage girl was said to be "extremely distressed" and is being kept in hospital under observation.

• UK father and son, 9, die in Australian landslide

The two bodies were recovered from the mountains, near the popular walking spot of Wentworth Falls, about 60 miles (96km) from Sydney, at about 09:30 local time on Tuesday.

Tour guide Graham Chapman said landslides are common in the Blue Mountains and have been made more likely by recent heavy rain.

"This beautiful family from England were just in the wrong place at the wrong time, it's so sad," he said.

"Maybe another 50 metres either side or a delay during the day, this wouldn't have happened."

A year dominated by storms and floods

by Phil Mercer, in the Blue Mountains

Torrential rain has returned to the Blue Mountains. Thick bands of low cloud have moved in, obscuring buildings and bushland.

As the rain beats down near Wentworth Falls, car headlights occasionally emerge from the mist. But this popular tourist destination is mostly quiet: walking tracks and some roads have been closed.

Months of heavy downpours are likely to have been a key factor in the tragedy involving the family of five from Britain.

They came on a day of rare sunshine in a year that's been dominated in much of eastern Australia by storms and floods.

In this World Heritage area, the ground is sodden and signs warn of the dangers of rockfalls and landslips. The earth and the famous sandstone cliffs have become saturated, and still it rains.

Landslides here are not uncommon - but rarely, if ever, have they devastated the lives of an entire family.

The family had set out on the hike on Monday in bright, sunny weather but the Blue Mountains had previously been lashed by weeks of heavy rain.

Mr Chapman said: "I've seen so many landslides I couldn't tell you how many. But the thing is with landslides here in the mountains, you don't actually get to hear about them a lot because it's so remote.

"Here in the mountains, it can change in the blink of an eye and sadly for the English family, that's exactly what happened the other day."

He said he had cried when he heard the news of their deaths, adding: "We've only just opened up our international borders, and to know that that family has come to our country and that this has happened on our soil, man, it's just heart breaking."

The family are understood to be members of the Zoroastrian religion, an ancient Iranian faith.

Zubin Appoo, president of the Australian Zoroastrian Association of New South Wales, said the accident was "beyond tragic". "Everyone is shocked and so many in our community are reaching out to offer support in any way they can."

Mr Appoo said tributes to the family were "flooding in", adding that the religion had a small and tight-knit global community.

New South Wales premier Dominic Perrottet told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation the incident was "tragic" and said he would be seeking advice as to whether the walking track should have been open.

The Department of Environment and Heritage in the state said the area was closed to the public until further notice and a "comprehensive review" would be undertaken.

It said it had a "world-class" programme in place to assess the risks of incidents such as landslides but "it is not possible to predict and eliminate all natural risks".

The walking trail had been inspected days before the landslide as part of a routine assessment, the department said.

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