For Jon and Meryn O'Brien, life changed immeasurably in July 2014, when the incomprehensible happened.
The O'Briens' 25-year-old son Jack was heading home to Sydney from a seven-week tour of Europe when the Malaysia Airlines flight he was travelling on was shot down.
Eight years on, his parents say rationally they know what happened, but still can't quite believe it.
"There's still a sort of sense of unreality and strangeness, a sense of bewilderment," Jon told the ABC News Daily Podcast.
This week Jon and Meryn will take their deep grief back to the Netherlands for what they hope will be a moment of truth when a court in Amsterdam delivers a verdict in the trial of four men accused of murdering the 298 passengers and crew on board MH17, including Jack.
"It brings us back to those feelings of really early days of just a real longing and sense of emptiness and that kind of raw grief," John said.
The accused
On trial are three Russians and one Ukrainian. All have links to Russian intelligence and are accused of moving a Buk missile launcher, carrying four missiles, from Russia to eastern Ukraine in the hours before MH17 was downed.
That the men are being tried in absentia only adds to the grief of the victims' families.
They have not been extradited from Russia, where they are presumably hiding away with the protection of the Kremlin.
They will not be jailed if found guilty.
Flight MH17 took off from Amsterdam's Schiphol airport on July 17, 2014, bound for Kuala Lumpur.
There were 38 Australians on board, along with 193 Dutch nationals, 43 Malaysians, 12 Indonesians, 10 Brits and passengers from Germany, Belgium, the Philippines and elsewhere.
The Malaysia Airlines plane was hit by a missile as it flew above eastern Ukraine at the height of the conflict between Ukrainian troops and Russia-backed separatists.
The wreckage landed in the separatist-controlled Donetsk region.
Australian Federal Police were instrumental in the joint investigation team (JIT) after the tragedy.
JIT is led by the Netherlands, and also includes investigators from Belgium, Malaysia and Ukraine.
A fourth journey to the Netherlands
Jon and Meryn will be among a large Australian contingent to travel to the Netherlands to watch the judges hand down their verdict.
The O'Briens have already made three gut-wrenching journeys to Amsterdam since the tragedy, the first to attend the opening of a memorial for the victims near the Schiphol airport in 2017.
The second was in 2019 to view CCTV of Jack's final moments before boarding the plane.
It was an offer from Dutch police that not every family accepted, but Meryn says she never regretted viewing 11 short segments, captured from the airport's security cameras. The longest was just 15 seconds.
Heartbreakingly, the vision showed Jack could have very well missed the flight.
"The last little bit [of vision], he was by himself, nearly everyone else was on board, he was actually running by then down this last corridor to get on the plane," Meryn said.
"I think we just felt, you know, Jack's not here and they were the last sort of steps of his journey on earth so yeah we just sat for hours [and watched]."
Jon and Meryn returned to Amsterdam for a third time in 2020 to witness the start of the trial.
They return this week with a sense of "nervousness" and growing "tension".
"There's a sense this is really important," Jon said, noting the "meticulous" gathering of evidence by the investigating team.
"You know so many people have been involved, there are a whole mass of people out there and we're grateful for all their careful work."
During the pandemic, the trial has continued, with the families able to watch proceedings online.
It's been a deeply difficult process — at one point the prosecution noted the accused had allegedly reacted with delight when an aircraft had been shot down.
"Maybe they thought they were aiming at a military aircraft, but they shot down a passenger plane. I got a sense when I first saw pictures of the four accused, my immediate gut reaction was these are hard men," Jon said.
"You know, these are men who don't care too much about human life and for whom human life is pretty cheap."
Jon said what stood out for him was the sheer mass of evidence the investigation team was able to compile.
That includes the painstaking reconstruction of the front of the aircraft, from 800 fragments recovered from the crash site.
The next of kin will be given an opportunity to view the shell while they are in the Netherlands.
'They were looking forward to spending time with their grandchildren'
Brisbane man Paul Guard, whose parents Jill and Roger were also killed, doesn't think he'll take up the offer, but wants to be there for the verdict.
He will travel to Amsterdam with his seven-year-old daughter and his sister Amanda.
Jill and Roger Guard were on their way home after enjoying a European cruise.
"They were mainly looking forward to getting home to spend time with their grandchildren, that was what mum was really looking forward to," Paul said.
"It's primarily just very sad that they missed out on such a wonderful part of their lives as a result of this tragedy."
Paul said he has always blamed those responsible for the conflict in Ukraine for the tragedy.
"What is really distressing me is that it's become much worse with the war this year, it's made my distress much greater I suppose because I have always seen the consequences of that conflict," he said.
"The longer it drags on the harder it is for me and the families of the other victims."
Paul said while he blames every person who has taken up arms in the conflict for his parents' death, as well as the Russian government, other parties also need to take responsibility.
"That includes the Ukrainian government for not shutting the airspace and also the airline for continuing to fly over Ukraine while a conflict was ongoing," he said.
Jon O'Brien holds the four men on trial responsible but also the Kremlin for the decision to invade Ukraine in 2014.
"The Russian leader must have known, I'm thinking he had a central role in all of this," he said.
Russia has always denied any responsibility.
While it's very unlikely the four men will ever be jailed, Jon points to a remark made by the prosecutors in court, that the most important outcome is the truth rather than the imposition of a punishment.
"On one level, justice is a fair trial, when all the evidence is put together and examined by independent judges and the verdict is believed," he said.
"But I'm a Christian and for me justice is redemption, a kind of restoration. What I really want is for Jack to have his life, for everyone on MH17 to have their lives, and that can't happen."
