Nick Smith has worked for Woolworths since 2007 and is currently Big W’s head of replenishment.
Images online show him taking his sons to a music festival as toddlers, describing the boys as “killing their first festival”.
The crime scene at 74 Chapman Parade in Faulconbridge.Credit: Kate Geraghty
On Wednesday morning, members of the Blue Mountains community had begun to lay flowers at the home, where the boys had lived their entire lives.
Neighbours darted across the road, their heads down as one laid a large bouquet with a handwritten note. A toddler left two Hot Wheels cars as his father held his hand.
A blue forensics tarpaulin shielded the house’s red door from the normally quiet street, with neighbours also closing ranks and declining to speak to the media about the family.
The boys’ school, Lawson’s Our Lady of the Nativity, issued a statement via the Catholic Schools Parramatta Diocese saying the community was “devastated” by the boys’ deaths.
Members of the Blue Mountains community arrived at the home on Wednesday to lay flowers and pay tribute.Credit: Kate Geraghty
“Counselling and wellbeing support is available to students and staff at Our Lady of the Nativity today, and will continue to be provided in the coming weeks,” the statement read.
Flowers have been placed outside the school, bundles of lavender and a small bouquet of daffodils – some bought from stores and others handpicked from gardens.
Premier Chris Minns said the “horrifying, very distressing” incident was another reminder of how difficult the job of emergency services workers could be.
“I can only imagine what the father of those two boys is going through today and I want to assure him the people of NSW are behind him as he deals with the turning of his life upside down,” he said.
Floral tributes lay at the entrance to Our Lady of the Nativity Primary in Lawson.Credit: Kate Geraghty
“(This) has obviously distressed the people of NSW and I want to assure them every help will be provided to the father of those two boys in the days ahead as he deals with this incredibly distressing situation.”
Blue Mountains City Council Mayor Mark Greenhill has described the deaths as “tragic” and “heartbreaking”.
In the immediate aftermath of the grim discovery, Superintendent John Nelson on Tuesday told reporters: “This is about as tragic as it gets for any police veteran. The Blue Mountains is a very peaceful, community-minded environment, so they [the community] will be genuinely shocked.”
According to Counting Dead Children Australia, the brothers are the 11th and 12th Australian children killed this year.
“The older and the more experienced you get in this job, things like this still cut to the core,” NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb said on Tuesday.
“What is not lost on me is that we’ve got officers here that have got children this age and that’s a normal human reaction that people would be affected when they’ve lost kids around their own children’s age. It’s a tragic situation.”
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