Selfie to Death! Couple Falls Off Cliff While Taking Selfies; Dies In Front of Kids

This is the age of the selfie. The word, and the practice, has become so widespread and commonplace that it got included in the Oxford English Dictionary's online edition last year and was even declared by the publication as the "word of the year."

However, such an ubiquitous and notoriously popular "habit" can have dangerous repercussions, as proved by a recent incident involving a 40-something Polish couple on holiday.

"A couple taking a photo on the edge of a cliff died when they fell hundreds of feet while their young children watched," USA Today reported. "The Polish couple died after falling from the rocky edge in Cabo da Roca in west Portugal. They were apparently taking a 'selfie' photo of themselves."

Not much details have been released about the incident, with the couple still yet to be named.

"The couple's children, aged five and six, witnessed the accident and are now undergoing psychiatric care," The Daily Mail said. "The parents apparently crossed a safety barrier in order to reach the cliff edge, but the police are still investigating their final moments."

It looks as if the couple, by throwing caution to the wind, unwittingly showed their children what exactly happens when one does not put safety first or breaches safety measures.

"A fireman at the scene told the Resident that Maritime Police should now act to remove trace of the little paths that run along the side of the cliff," local news source Portugal Resident said. Almoçageme fire station's José Dias said: "The paths encourage people. Tourists think they must lead somewhere. They climb the fences - not thinking that they have been erected to protect people's lives - and then terrible things like this happen."

"It's a very difficult place to access. The cliff there is unstable. It is taking time," Dias said about their efforts to recover the bodies, which lay at the bottom of the ravine.

"The family had apparently gone up the path between the lighthouse and the edge of the cliff, and the parents had approached the drop down to the ravine - giving their children, aged 5 and 6, the camera - to take the kind of shot everyone visiting the landmark likes to take," the site went on to say.

A security guard told the news source that while he didn't see the actual fall happen, a Spanish couple did and "rushed to the aid of the children and brought them back down."

"They were traumatised. It is the kind of thing they will never forget," José Gonçalves, the security guard, noted. "People just don't think. So often I have seen situations where all it would take is a puff of wind and down would go a group of smiling Japanese ... Tourists are so keen to get the perfect photograph, they forget their own safety."

Some reports have said that the family in question had been living in Portugal for a couple of years now and are thought to be from Lisbon.