The mother of 15-year-old Olivia Campbell — who attended the Ariana Grande concert in Manchester England, with a friend — confirmed her daughter’s death in a Facebook post.
“RIP my darling precious gorgeous girl Olivia Campbell taken far far too soon go sing with the angels and keep smiling mummy loves you so much,” Charlotte Campbell posted on her Facebook page early Wednesday local time.
Olivia was registered as missing person No. 13 hours after the Manchester Arena bombing that killed 22 people.
“We thought she would have just walked home by that point,” Charlotte told CNN on Tuesday.
Campbell had not heard from Olivia since Monday night. Her daughter had called her earlier in the evening, before a suspected suicide attacker detonated a bomb outside the arena as throngs of teenagers were leaving the show.
The suspected bomber died in the blast Monday night, which left the wounded and the dead scattered across the arena’s bloodied entrance and sent screaming girls running for cover.
Before she was found, her parents had frantically searched for her.
“We’re going to (search) … and we’ll do it every single day until we find that little girl,” Olivia’s stepfather, Paul Hodgson, said in an earlier interview, his voice breaking. “Whatever it takes.”
Olivia had gone to the concert with her friend Adam to celebrate his birthday. Her stepfather said Olivia liked to sing herself. She loved music.
“It was like a dream come true to her,” Hodgson said of the concert.
Olivia had called her mother to say how happy she was to be at the arena. She was waiting for Ariana Grande to come on.
“She thanked me and said she loved me and that was the last I heard from her,” Campbell said earlier, close to tears.
When she learned about the attack, Campbell said, she notified the police, called local hospitals and, with the help of a friend, sent out descriptions of Olivia on Facebook and Twitter.
“I’m going to find her,” Hodgson said earlier. “I’m going to bring her home.”
