Hunter Valley bus crash: How Mitchell Gaffney and Maddy Edsell’s wedding turned into a nightmare
Cast against a backdrop of rolling hills and bathed in the winter sun of the Hunter Valley, Maddy Edsell and Mitchell Gaffney said their ‘I dos’. Hours later, tragedy struck.
Cast against a backdrop of rolling hills, and bathed in the winter sun of the Hunter Valley, Maddy Edsell and Mitchell Gaffney said their ‘I dos’. She wore white, he wore beige; they cut the cake and danced into the night.
But in a tragic turn of events, the couple’s “best day of our lives” would quickly become their worst, after 10 of their guests died in a horrific crash, just 17 minutes after leaving the venue.
While most newlyweds wake the day after their wedding with high hopes of being whisked onto a plane and away on a honeymoon, Gaffney and Edsell remained holed up in their home as about a dozen friends and family came to console them.
NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb on Monday afternoon confirmed some of those onboard the bus were from interstate. “It’s my understanding that, at the wedding, and indeed on the bus, are people from a number of areas, both local and within the Singleton (local government area), but also from Sydney and perhaps Queensland and Victoria,” Webb said.
The Daily Telegraph has today revealed the names of the victims whose families have been notified by NSW Police and told that formal identification could take days, if not weeks.
The victims are: Andrew and Lynan Scott, a husband and wife from Singleton; mother and daughter Nadene and Kyah McBride also from Singleton along with Kayah’s boyfriend Kane Symons; Zachary Bray from Byron Bay; Angus Craig from Queensland; and Darcy Bullman, Tori Cowburn and Rebecca Mullen, all from Singleton.
Groomsman Brandon Stafford was on board the bus when it toppled, and was among those injured. His mother told Nine News he had pulled passengers from the flipped bus before being taken to hospital himself. Mr Stafford is being treated for a broken jaw at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney’s inner west.
After growing up together in the outer Melbourne suburb of Warrandyte, Gaffney and Edsell moved to the Upper Hunter Region of NSW after completing their tertiary studies.
Gaffney, a chemical engineering graduate from the University of Melbourne, landed a job at Yancoal Australia’s Hunter Valley operations as a process engineer. The couple set up in Singleton, a mining town known for its pubs, friendly community and historic architecture. They embedded themselves in the community, both joining the Singleton Roosters Australian Football Club. Gaffney was club treasurer for a stint, while Edsell and her sister Breanna became staple members of the Roosterettes. Some of their clubmates were at the wedding, but it is unclear whether they were in the bus crash.
As their wedding date neared, Gaffney and Edsell competed in the Port Macquarie half-marathon together with friend Alex Tigani, who had agreed to MC their upcoming nuptials.
Tigani’s mother, Loretta, would later say her son had become “covered in other people’s blood” after seeing his friends die in the crash. “He was very emotional because he’s seen a lot of his mates die,” she said. “It’s a small town so everyone knows each other.”
Edsell arrived at the wedding in a 1952 convertible VW Beetle, which her father had prepared especially for the day.
“They’ve been holding on to it for 42 years,” wedding celebrant Ashley Ogle told her Instagram followers, in the hours before the crash. “It was so cool to see her rock up in this bug.”
The pair engaged in an intimate “first look”, where the bride and groom met before the ceremony to enjoy a private moment before the festivities kicked off.
Edsell arrived at the ceremony through a line of trees, a golden silhouette cast around her, as she walked to wed her beloved.
Ten people were declared dead and 26 more sent to hospital, after a Linq Buslines coach transporting guests from the wedding at Wandin Estate winery to Singleton, crashed at Greta about 11.30pm on Sunday.
The bus driver, Brett Button, was held at Cessnock police station on Monday, having been charged with 10 counts of dangerous driving occasioning death, and one count of negligent driving occasioning death.
He will face court on Tuesday.
The bus was pulled upright by late Monday afternoon, about 15 hour afters it had rolled on its side. The police operation will continue overnight to recover the bodies from the wreckage, and identify the dead.
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