The parents of two brothers crushed to death at an ice glacier will not leave New Zealand until they can take both sons home to Australia, a relative says.
The two Indian-born Australian brothers had been travelling around New Zealand with their parents Ronald and Winnie Miranda since just after Christmas, and Fox glacier on the country's South Island was their final stop before heading home on Sunday.
Both parents were at the glacier when hundreds of tonnes of ice and snow fell on their only two children.
New Zealand search and rescue teams have recovered the body of Ashish Miranda, 24, but dangerous conditions at the glacier have prevented further searches for Akshay, 22.
Benny Lewis, of Mumbai, says she spoke to her grief-stricken sister Mrs Miranda about 8am on Saturday.
Ms Lewis said her sister told her she would remain with her husband in New Zealand until the body of Akshay was recovered from the site.
"I spoke to them. They are very shaken up and traumatised by this tragedy and we are hopefully waiting for them to dig out the younger one, Akshay," Ms Lewis told AAP.
"They have plans to stay indefinitely - every parent would not want to move out without recovering their child.
"So they're waiting, they're hoping against hope, the sooner the better. There's been a lot of rain I think in New Zealand so there's some hope of the ice melting.
"We all are just praying that something happens like the good rain has some mercy on my poor sister and my brother-in-law and (that) the body is recovered.
"(The rescuers) really don't know how deep the poor child has been buried."
She said her two daughters had grown up with the brothers in Mumbai before they moved to Australia in 2000 and had maintained a strong bond.
"Bombay has always been a base," Ms Lewis said.
"We are all traumatised.
"The boys were very close to us because we were a very well-knit family."
