"I feel like I'm in a nightmare that I can't wake up from no matter how much I want to." This groundbreaking message Crystal Owen wrote on social media in response to the death of her son, Harvey, 17, on Tuesday, November 21. The teenager had gone camping with his friends - Jevon Hirst, 16, Wilf Fitchett, 17, and Hugo Morris, 18 - and after long hours of searching and an agonizing wait it was confirmed that the four lost their lives in a "tragic accident" on the road in the Snowdonia (or Eryri) national park in Wales.

"I just wanted to say that I appreciate people's kindness, but no number of messages is going to help me get through this. Nothing will make this nightmare go away," the devastated mother added on Facebook. Wilf Fitchett's girlfriend, Maddi, vented her hopelessness on Instagram: "I'm going to miss you forever. The sweetest, most loving guy I've ever met... I can't imagine my world without you."

The families raised the alarm on Monday morning when the children did not return to their homes in Shrewsbury, an English town near the border with Wales. They had set out together on Saturday with plans to camp in Snowdonia - although Harvey told his mother he was going to sleep at a friend's grandfather's house - and were tracked down on Sunday, by a mobile phone signal, in the Welsh town of Harlech.

The search operation concluded 19 hours later, when a truck driver spotted the wrecked vehicle. The car, a silver Ford Fiesta, was found half-submerged in the cold waters of a river near the village of Garret in a mountainous area with hairpin bends. Inside were the lifeless bodies of the four students.

Police were continuing to investigate the crash this afternoon, scouring the area. Journalists and residents of the tourist district of north Wales suggested that bad weather - with wind and rain over the weekend - and the driver's unfamiliarity with Snowdonia's narrow and difficult roads may have contributed to the terrible tragedy.

The vehicle is thought to have left the roadway on a curve and rolled downhill through bushes and trees until it overturned and came to rest in a ditch. The Ford Fiesta would have been hidden from the line of sight of drivers of similar cars. A stretch of the county road remained closed to traffic Wednesday afternoon.

The tributes in memory of the four teenagers have not ceased since the confirmation of their demise. Candles were lit on the parapet of a bridge near the crash site, in churches in villages in the national park (it has been renamed Eryri's Welsh name) and in the teenagers' hometown.

In Shrewsbury, the traditional act of lighting the Christmas lights in the Market Square has also been suspended, which was filled with letters, postcards, notes and floral tributes from colleagues and countrymen of Harvey, Jevon, Wilf and Hugo.

The four of them studied together as children and met again at Shrewsbury College, where they were in their pre-university degrees. The school has suffered a litany of misfortunes this fall, with three near-consecutive deadly incidents since late September.

"It is heartbreaking that the lives of these four young men have been so tragically cut short," said the Archbishop of Wales, Andrew John.

UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak expressed his condolences in the Westminster Parliament and opposition Labour leader Keir Starmer echoed the collective sentiment, saying: "It's a living nightmare for any parent. I can hardly begin to imagine his loss."

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