Mechanical engineer Paul Weeks, 39, was travelling en route to Mongolia for his first shift as part of a fly-in-fly-out job for a mining and construction company, a job he was excited about.

Originally from New Zealand, he lives in Perth’s north-eastern suburbs with his wife and their two young sons, aged three years old and 10 months.

“I’m taking it minute by minute,” his wife Danica told reporters in Perth. “I can’t think beyond the minute. I’ve got two young kids, and I have a three-year-old asking, ‘When is daddy going to Skype?'”

— PHOTO: FACEBOOK