John McCain’s heartbroken daughter broke down in tears as she bid her late father farewell alongside his grieving wife at a memorial service on Wednesday.
Meghan was pictured sobbing as she knelt over her father’s casket at the Arizona Capitol in Phoenix, while his wife of 38 years Cindy tenderly touched her cheek against the flag draping her husband’s coffin, before kissing it.
Following the private service, his body will lie in state ahead of a private service at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis on Sunday.
The US senator and former prisoner of war passed away at the age of 81 on Saturday evening with Cindy and their family by his bedside.
“Senator John Sidney McCain III died at 4:28pm on August 25, 2018. With the senator when he passed were his wife Cindy and their family,” his office confirmed in a statement.
“At his death, he had served the United States of America faithfully for 60 years.”
Dressed head to toe in black and wearing elegant pearls, Cindy led mourners inside the service as she stepped up first to kiss her late husband’s casket. She was then followed by his sons in uniform and daughter Meghan, who broke down when it got to her turn to say goodbye.
On what would have been his 82nd birthday, McCain’s closest family and friends watched on as a motorcade with his body arrived ahead of the public voiwing later in the day.
Cindy admitted her “heart is broken” in a moving message on Twitter following her husband’s death, and wrote: “My heart is broken. I am so lucky to have lived the adventure of loving this incredible man for 38 years. He passed the way he lived, on his own terms, surrounded by the people he loved, in the the place he loved best.”
That was followed by a loving message from their daughter Meghan, who recalled her father’s final moments in a lengthy note, shared online.
His death came just a day after the McCain family released a heartbreaking statement announcing he would be ceasing treatment for his aggressive brain cancer.
The former presidential nominee, and once a prisoner of war, initially announced news of his cancer in July last year.
The tumour was discovered through tissue analysis after the senator had a blood clot removed from his eye.