This isn't the way you should learn about the death of your 17-year-old brother.

According to Sydney's Daily Telegraph, twins Angela and Maryanne Vourlis had just woken up on their 20th birthday. Like most young adults, they logged onto Facebook to check their walls and inboxes for birthday greetings.

Instead of finding happy birthday wishes, the twins found messages of "RIP Bobby" (their brother) and "RIP Chris Naylor" (a friend of his) all across their Facebook newsfeeds. Completely shocked, baffled and hurt, the two rang their brother's phone in the hopes that it was a mistake. It was to no avail.

Next, they rang their mother. While she didn't receive any word from the police or others about Bobby or Chris Naylor, she did know that Bobby was with his friend that night. After a call to the police, they confirmed what they had learned on Facebook: That Bobby Vourlis was dead. He passed away along with Chris Naylor in a fatal car accident that also took the life of a third teenage passenger.

You can read the whole heartbreaking story over at the Daily Telegraph, but it's clear that the real-time nature of the web spread information far faster than even the police or phone calls could. While we understand it takes time to identify victims and send an officer to a residence to inform family of the news, the process can simply take too long in today's world.

We offer our condolences to both families for the tragedy they are enduring. We could not imagine learning about it the way they did.

[via CNET]