‘I believed with all my heart she’d survive’
ALEX Ednan-Laperouse got 10 seconds with his older sister Natasha on the phone to say he loved her before she died.
In an article for The Times, Alex opened up about his last moments with his sister and her lasting legacy.
On the day Natasha died, a then 13-year-old Alex was supposed to be going to a trampoline park with his friends, but then his mum got a call from his dad saying that ‘Tash’ had “become really unwell” on the plane to Nice and was unconscious.
Alex said: “I remember my mum panicking and trying to buy a plane ticket to get to France as quickly as possible.”
A family friend drove him to his grandma’s house where he tried to comfort her and told her Tash would make it.
“I believed with all my heart she was going to survive,” he said.
However, later in the day he got a call from his dad saying his sister was a few minutes away from dying. Their mum was still at Stansted airport because her flight had been delayed, so she also had to say goodbye over the phone.
Alex said: “Tash was unconscious but I thanked her for being such a great sister to me and told her I loved her very much. I only spoke to her for 10 to 15 seconds and then the phone call ended. Everything changed from there.”
His immediate reaction was of “deep shock”.
“I remember this feeling of deep shock, and my lungs felt like they had collapsed,” he wrote.
“I started crying uncontrollably. Afterwards I didn’t eat for three days because I felt sick all the time.”
He added: “Tash had a funny, contagious laugh. If she started laughing, everyone else in the room would start laughing too. We laughed a lot together.
“She was feisty, she had a lot of character and she cared about people.
“She had a real sense of justice and she wanted to help people.
“She wanted to be a human rights lawyer and that’s my dream now to be one. Tash was such an inspiration to me.”