Waikato sisters Rebecca and Petria Martin are the latest New Zealanders confirmed dead after a magnitude 8.3 earthquake and tsunami devastated Samoa last Wednesday.
Their parents, Kerry and Lynne, have been staying in the village of Alafoa, near Apia, since Friday.
At a press conference today they said they would be bringing their daughters' bodies back to New Zealand. "We've got our girls and we're taking them home," Lynne Martin said.
Rebecca (24) taught at Rototuna Primary School, 9km north of Hamilton, and Petria (22) was a team leader at Matamata's sports centre.
They were the middle two of four sisters, The Dominion Post reported.
Mrs Martin said she and her husband had just visited the scene where their daughters died.
The devastation was utterly amazing, Mr Martin said. The couple had met some survivors who had been with their daughters at the time the tsunami hit, and they had been "just unlucky".
He said the girls had run, but the waters got them.
The couple will fly home with the remains on Monday night (Samoa time), arriving in Auckland on Wednesday and they plan a large funeral in Matamata on Saturday.
The sisters' deaths bring the official New Zealand death toll to seven.
South Auckland grandmother Tauaavaga Tupuola, 84, Raglan woman Mary Anne White, another adult and two children were also confirmed dead.
Two-year-old Alphie Cunliffe, whose British parents had moved to New Zealand, was also missing and presumed dead.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade were still trying to trace 10 other New Zealanders -- some of whom may have left the Pacific Island already.
The ministry has asked for anyone who had heard from loved ones who were in Samoa at the time of the quake to contact them immediately.
Meanwhile a New Zealand medical team has begun operating on those injured during the quake and tsunami.
The team arrived in Apia yesterday and today face a full theatre schedule, with lots of broken bones and lacerations, theatre nurse Debbie Ratima said. More patients could also be coming down from the hills in coming days, she said.
The confirmed death toll for the Samoa, which bore the brunt of last Wednesday's tsunami, was 135, with eight people still missing.
The tsunami also claimed nine lives in Tonga and 32 in American Samoa, with four still missing there.
A planned mass burial for Samoans killed in the tragedy will take place on Thursday (Friday NZT), two days later than originally suggested by the government to give overseas-based relatives of the dead time to return.
A revised government estimate put damage to infrastructure, public and private properties at 380 million Samoa Tala ($NZ181.93million).
Oxfam aid worker Janna Hamilton said staff from local organisations and international aid agencies were looking for people still hiding in jungle-clad higher ground after fleeing the south-facing beaches, where the tsunami hit.
"There are still a lot of people who are pretty shell-shocked," she told NZPA.
Oxfam's major current concern was making fresh water available to the communities -- though the clean-up was still under way, reconstruction was already in its early stages, she said.
A New Zealand Air Force Boeing 757 landed in Apia yesterday, carrying medical and food supplies and police dog search teams, as well as the medical team.
HMNZS Canterbury was expected to sail from New Zealand on Tuesday with more aid and equipment.
