‘I knew I had to come here’: emotional scenes as footbridge used to carry out Bondi terror attack reopens

Mourners paid respects on Thursday as the footbridge used by shooters to target a Hanukah celebration at Bondi beach reopened. Photograph: David Gray/AFP/Getty Images

When the crime scene of Bondi’s devastating mass shooting was reopened to the public on Thursday morning, Noah felt no hesitation in what to do.

The close friend of slain Rabbi Eli Schlanger went straight to the footbridge where two alleged terrorists had fired on a Hanukah celebration at Archer Park on Sunday evening. Standing there, Noah sang a Jewish prayer.

“I’m feeling very emotional,” he told Guardian Australia.

“[Schlanger] was a fighter, not just when it was good, but when it was the darkest of times, and he was also a man of peace.

“I knew I had to come here and fight. I’m a religious singer, and I felt like standing on the top of the bridge and just singing a memorial prayer for him, blasting it out with my heart.”

Mourners and those who gathered to leave tributes outside Bondi Pavilion on Thursday morning quietly began to filter over the footbridge after the crime scene was lifted just after 11am, after the police operation ended.

Some stood silently, staring out to the ocean, as others hugged after crossing into the park from Campbell Parade and sobbed beneath the trees.

Jay stood on the footbridge with her two friends, under the shade of an umbrella.

She was visiting from Earlwood to pay respects to the Jewish community.

“I think people are in shock at this stage,” she said. “I hope the Jewish community feel the support they’re getting from the public. I hope they feel that.”

Before leaving, her friend took up a conversation with a Jewish community member who had been standing in reflective silence. “You’re not alone,” her friend told him. “We stand with you.”

A large menorah stood unlit near the playground, as police filtered through the area.

Noah, who didn’t wish for his surname to be used, said the Jewish community would return to the area on Sunday night to hold an event, one week after the terror attack.

“Schlanger brought people together,” he said. “This is what he would want us to do.”

Near the entrance, a New South Wales police officer pointed to a tree, saying a colleague had sheltered behind it as the two gunmen fired on them on Sunday.

He pointed to divots in the bark where two bullets had ricocheted, describing the officer who was there on Sunday as “very lucky”.

The park, usually a hive of activity and an entry point to Bondi beach, was solemn, as a memorial for the 15 victims of the attack grew outside the nearby pavilion, drawing crowds of survivors and their fellow Australians throughout the day.

Will Nemesh, the mayor of Waverley Council, home to Bondi, said the community had been “in shock, has been in mourning and it has been in grief” since the “unspeakable acts of evil committed here”.

Some semblance of Bondi had returned to normal by Thursday afternoon. Earlier in the day, the beach’s surf lifesavers hoisted the red and yellow flags for the first time since Sunday. Swimmers and beachgoers quickly took to the waves as a second memorial of flowers on the promenade grew, with the ocean in the distance.

But it wasn’t summer as usual at the packed tourist destination.

Jill travelled down to Sydney from the Central Coast to support the Jewish community with her friend, and had laid flowers at Bondi Pavilion before visiting the footbridge.

“We just want them to know that they’re loved, and our arms are wrapped around them,” she said.

“We’re crying with them too.

“It’s horrible what happened. Standing right here … it’s unbelievable.”