Road Of Death Claims 3 More

A seaside community mourns as questions swirl around fatal crash

- Pieter Van Zyl

CHILDREN play in the shal­ low waters on the beach at Herolds Bay. It looks and smells like holiday – the fresh sea breeze, people eating ice cream, others sunning themselves on the silvery sand, seagulls dip­ping and swooping over the water. But a sombre scene behind the life­ guards’ station tells you it isn’t just anoth­ er early summer day in this seaside village near George in the Western Cape.

Ettienne Scheepers (36), an electrician and owner of the local Beans & Basil café, is waiting with friends and colleagues for the return of a rubber duck belonging to the local National Sea Rescue Institute (NSRI).

It’s believed they’ve found the body of Ettienne’s wife, Heidi (35), who disappeared four days earlier with the couple’s children, Cuzette (6) and Hugo (2).

Police divers found little Hugo two days ago in the sea offVoëlklip near George – he was floating, still strapped in his car seat, in one of the crevices in a cliff face.

Cops also found wreckage of the Volks­wagen Caravelle Heidi was driving when she left Herolds Bay with the two children on the afternoon of 22 October.

That evening Ettienne waited in vain at their home in the neighbouring village of Oubaai for his family to return.

Earlier today a Herolds Bay resident spotted a body floating on the ocean through a pair of binoculars. Now Etti­enne and his party are waiting for the NSRI boat to return. Residents and beach­ goers are sitting on concrete terraces sur­ rounding the beach – an amphitheatre for the unfolding of a real­life drama.

Soon after 2.30pm police evacuate the beach as the rescue boat races through waves and slides onto the sand.