The 21-year-old was driving and the family friend was travelling in the passenger seat, while the driver’s younger brothers were in the back seat when their silver Nissan Navara left the road and hit a tree at about 12.30 am.

Three young brothers, one of them a nine-year-old child, and a family friend have been killed in a fatal car crash near the West Australian Wheatbelt town of Clackline, about an hour northeast of Perth.

The brothers, aged 21, 19, and nine, sustained catastrophic injuries and died at the scene in Clackline in the early hours of Friday morning, along with a 45-year-old man who was a family friend from New South Wales.

Police say the crash happened at 12:30 a.m. when their silver Nissan Navara left Great Eastern Highway and hit a tree.

Police Superintendent Gene Pears said the accident site was a confronting scene for first responders. He described the accident as “heartbreaking”.

“My heart goes out to the families, when you lose anyone in a crash but when you lose three young men in the prime of their lives and a friend, this will have lifelong impacts for that family, for their friends, and for our community,” Pears told reporters

“This is a heartbreaking incident for WA… unimaginable,” he added

Pears said the 21-year-old was driving the car, with the 45-year-old man in the front passenger seat and the driver’s younger brothers in the back when the accident occurred.

Major crash investigators are investigating the incident.

Pears said support was being provided to the first responders at the scene.

“I attended the scene this morning and as you can imagine it was a very confronting scene for first responders to attend and investigate that scene,” he said.

“Naturally, we’re providing support for all of the people who attended this morning and who did an amazing job under extremely hard conditions.”

Major Crash detectives want to hear from anyone who saw a silver Nissan Navara ute travelling in the area overnight.

Anyone with information or dashcam footage of the ute before the crash is urged to contact Crime Stoppers.

Western Australia is on track to record the worst year for road fatalities in nearly a decade.

At least 60 people so far this year have died on the roads, compared with 46 this time last year.

It is the highest figure since 2016 when there were 62 deaths recorded.

More than half of this year’s fatalities happened in regional West Australia.