Bronte Schofield cried on Saturday as she revealed she and her sister Kirra missed the Westfield Bondi Junction massacre by just “30 minutes”.
The pair were about to arrive at the shopping center more than half an hour before knifeman Joel Cauchi began his horrific attack at 3.30pm, which left six people dead.
However, the sisters say they felt bad and decided to turn around at the last second and go home, Schofield, 29, revealed in an emotional video she shared on Instagram.
“We were literally in the car… it was 2:40 p.m. and Kirra said, ‘I feel really bad,’ and I said, ‘Yeah, I feel really flat.’ It was like our energies disappeared,” she said.
‘We were passing through Bondi Junction when we both felt that. I know people are going to think we’re crazy.’
Bronte Schofield, 29 (left), cried on Saturday as she revealed she and her sister Kirra, 26 (right), missed the Westfield Bondi Junction massacre by just “30 minutes”.
Schofield went on to say that Kirra, 26, decided at the last minute to turn the car around and take them both home instead of stopping at the mall as planned.
‘I can’t explain the guilt I feel. “It’s such a strange feeling knowing you’re supposed to be somewhere, it’s like a butterfly effect,” he added.
‘I don’t even want to imagine what it would have been like to be there… It makes me feel physically bad. It really hurts the heart. I hate how sorry I am.’
The pair were about to arrive at the shopping center more than half an hour before knifeman Joel Cauchi (pictured) began his horrific attack at 3.30pm that left six people dead.
She continued, “I can’t even imagine how these families feel because it was my idea to go there and put my sister in danger like that.”
Schofield also shared text messages he shared with Kirra and another friend in the moments following news of the deaths caused by the attack.
Police were called to the Westfield shopping center in Sydney’s Bondi Junction after reports that a man with a knife was stabbing shoppers at 3.30pm on Saturday.
However, the sisters ‘felt bad’ and decided to turn around at the last second and go home, Schofield revealed in an emotional video she shared on Instagram.
Schofield also shared text messages she shared with Kirra and another friend in the moments following news of the deaths caused by the attack.
Witnesses say Cauchi chased and slashed shoppers while going on a wild rampage, killing six and wounding seven, including a baby, before police shot him dead.
Among the dead was Ash Good, a 38-year-old Sydney mother, who threw her injured nine-month-old baby at a passerby in an attempt to save his life.
The baby is undergoing surgery and it is believed that the two were the first to be attacked by the attacker.
A heroic police officer, New South Wales Police Inspector Amy Scott, confronted and shot Cauchi dead during his rampage.
Police were called to the Westfield shopping center in Sydney’s Bondi Junction after reports that a man with a knife was stabbing shoppers at 3.30pm on Saturday. In the photo: Joel Cauchi.