The Kyle & Jackie O Show
💔 Bondi Attack Victims Wayne & Vanessa on Finding Their Daughter After The Attack.
22 Jan 2026
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Sheer panic in Bondi. A deadly act of terror at Bondi Beach. 16 people dead.
This was the worst terror attack in the history of Australia. Today is a national day of mourning for the victims and anyone affected by the Bondi attack. I know just personally, Jackie, I was with my wife at Bondi when this happened. A lot of Jewish friends were with us. People that knew people that were shot.
Chapter 2: What happened during the Bondi Beach attack?
on site were with me. And not being there, it was bad enough, but being there and being caught up in it, it's just a horrific situation.
Yeah, I honestly can't imagine. We're going to be talking to Wayne and Vanessa. They were at the Hanukkah by the sea event when this broke out and they lost their three-year-old daughter, Gigi. When I say lost, I mean like lost sight of her and could not find her.
And then if you listen to their kind of report of it when it made Sky News, people were listening to this and imagining what it must have been like for them.
Let's have a listen to that Sky News report. Then we'll bring Wayne and Vanessa on for a chat today. Here's the report as it went to air.
There were bullets all around me. All I can do is screaming, where is my family? Where's my little girl? Where's my little girl? I saw her dancing for a second and she was gone. I actually had a police officer drag me out. He was shot in the head and he grabbed me and goes, get down. I said, my baby, my baby, my baby. I'm calling whoever I could that was there, my baby. No one had my baby.
And I gave Capri to Vanessa. I said, I'm going to go look for Gigi. I went. I was looking. There was just blood and bodies everywhere. And I found, I just saw she was wearing a pink skirt. And I saw this lady lying on top of her. She had been shot.
The lady had been shot?
She had been shot, yeah. She said, I've got your daughter. I've been protecting her. She was lying on top of Gigi. Gigi was lying under her. I saw the blood. I got the fright of my life. I said, don't worry. That's not her blood. That's my blood. But I said, you've saved my daughter's life. I said, I'll be indebted to you for the rest of my life.
Oh, my goodness. I am teary at the moment, like a lot of people when they saw this. When I saw it, I burst into tears. Those with children can only imagine the horror.
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Chapter 3: How did Wayne and Vanessa lose sight of their daughter Gigi?
But thank the Lord that child was okay. And that woman who threw herself over the child, that is another hero. There's hero after hero after hero in this situation. So I'm sorry, I can barely speak after hearing that. Wayne and Vanessa, you're on. I'm in tears. I can only begin to imagine what you guys have been through. How are you doing today?
I know that's a loose question, but are you coping all right? You got Gigi and is she doing okay?
Hi, Carl. Hi, Jackie. Hi. It's nice to talk to you.
I haven't heard that since a month ago. This is probably the second time I'm hearing that, so it's quite raw for me.
I'm sorry, but it's such a bloody shock to so many people. The worst thing that you could ever imagine being a parent, being down by the ocean, enjoying your own community and your own faith and the kids running around, and then for this parent to do what happened. When you saw the blood on your daughter's outfit, you must have initially thought, the worst.
Yeah, so just going back to that moment, so I was lying on top of my other daughter, my four-year-old, during the whole event, and we didn't know where Gigi was, so we had to wait until the shooting had stopped, and I was still lying on her, and no one was moving in the event, and I just recall I heard someone say, oh, they've got them, they've got them.
I just got up, I picked up, and I ran with my other daughter, and Vanessa was by the parking lot, and I passed her,
capri to vanessa and then i had to go back in and look for her and searching i was expecting the worst there was no one up and there was just so much you know so many people hurt and dead and when i saw my little girl and it was just yeah that feeling of relief when i when her face i could see she looked up at me and she had blood and i thought that was her blood and that was It was terrifying.
When you saw the blood, you thought, that's her blood. The woman who was protecting your child, Gigi, she said, that's not her blood, that's my blood. And that must have been shocking for the woman, but a relief as a father.
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Chapter 4: What was the emotional experience of finding Gigi after the attack?
And I tried to grab it. And I just wanted to go in and save lives. I understand that. I understand that. I was in fight mode. I said, if I've lost my child and I just knew, like, I know it sounds terrible, I just knew that my husband and... Capri were next because I saw the gunman walk down.
If it wasn't for Ahmed, I tell you now, my husband and my daughter wouldn't be here and it would have been multiple Multiple. More.
Yeah, he, when I've looked at the videos and I know where I was lying on top of my daughter, if Ahmed Al Ahmed didn't disarm that gunman, he was walking in because when you see the videos, everyone was lying down and undercover. They didn't know where to shoot.
This guy appeared to be going down into the vicinity where everyone was taking cover.
Yes, yes. He was coming down to, yeah, it was, he is, yeah, you can't celebrate that hero enough of how many lives that he's saved. What are you guys doing today?
When you guys were on the ground, what were you like – because if you're just lying on the ground and you're protecting your daughter, that must have just been – because people who weren't even close to it, they were at the south end of the beach, said that it sounded like the gunman was right there. So those shots travel like the sound travels.
It's really hard to get a gauge on where exactly he is. Did you have an awareness? Could you see him and where was he in relation to where you guys were? And were you thinking of running or just staying lying down?
So when Vanessa first called me and said, have you got Gigi? And I said, no. And I thought, okay, I need to go look for her. And I was lying on top of Capri and there was this other guy facing, I was under this Bunnings table and he was lying facing me, not under my table, but using my table as visible protection. And, um, I thought, okay, let me go out. I said, make sure she doesn't move.
And as I stuck my head out, somebody shouted, get down, get down, stay down. I've actually heard that on one of the videos that we're taking. There was no chance we could move. But when I was lying there, when it first happened, I thought, okay, police stations 500 metres away, less than 500, I could run it. in two minutes and it was just going on and on.
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Chapter 5: How did the community react to the Bondi Beach tragedy?
And we all expect and appreciate other people's views. And these tragedies that pop up, They're amongst us, and there's no easy answer to eradicate this sort of behaviour, but this is what happens when things bubble up in the media or hate groups bubble up and people start shitting on and carrying on with their own bullshit. Sorry, go on, mate.
No, I wanted to just make one point, like how we were feeling. Like actually when we were driving towards that event, Vanessa, like on our way there that evening, Vanessa said to me when we were driving down, are you sure this is safe? You know, we're under such threat in Australia. I said to her, of course this is safe. We're in Australia.
When I was lying under that table and the bullets were going off and the gunfire and people getting hurt and killed, I was thinking to myself how wrong I was about how I thought it was safe.
And that's a tragedy in itself, to not know that Bondi Beach is safe for a religious community to celebrate a substantial holiday.
Have you been back to Bondi? I don't know if you've been back or not. Lots of times. Lots of times.
It's, you know, we need to heal. We need to go back. We need to mourn. It is our happy place. We can't fear it. You know, it's everyone's happy place. We're Australian. We deserve to feel free and to not fear. And this will make us stronger. We'll get through it. We'll get through it as a family. We have the most amazing community.
And it's united the whole of Australia. I mean, the support that we've had and, you know, people of all different race and religions reaching out to us. I think the one thing, you know, mantra that we've had is, you know, amongst all this darkness, the only way to dispel darkness is to bring light.
And just like Chris Min said earlier on the show, in the Jewish faith, it's called the mitzvah and it's, I think for everyone today on this day of mourning, just to do one good deed, whether it's giving charity or reaching out to a friend you haven't spoken to or praying for someone that's sick and have them in your thoughts and hope for their healing.
I think just doing good deeds brings light into this world, and that's how we can dispel all the darkness.
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Chapter 6: What impact has the attack had on Wayne and Vanessa's family?
And we so appreciate both of you for coming on and talking about it today. Thanks, Wayne and Vanessa. Appreciate it.
Thanks so much for having us. We really love your show and thanks for having us on.
Oh, you're very welcome. Thank you. And you know what the good thing about this show is, Jackie, we have all faiths listening to this, even the faithless, like Bruno out there, a faithless heathen. Bonjour. Yeah, he's a faithless heathen.
Bruno, you don't have faith at all in anything?
No, I was an altar boy for ages, but no, I just, you know, when I'm gone, I'm gone. Okay, well, isn't that a horrible way to think?
No, but, like, I'm still trying to be happy. Thank you, Bruno. Trying to wrap this up here on a positive note. Okay, thank you. You've been great. Thank you so much. Kyle and Jackie O.
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