The two men who died in a crash in Darwin on Wednesday night were Tamil asylum seekers from Sri Lanka who came to Australia for a better life, their friends have said.

Close to a dozen friends of the Jesuraj Croos Arulnasan and Emmanuel Reval returned to the area on Thursday night where the crash happened on Trower Road in Nakara, trying to make sense of the accident for themselves.

“We’ve just come to have a look at what happened to my friends,” Thakshan Murugesh told the ABC.

“We are all from the same country so I’m feeling very sad.

“I am feeling very, very bad.”

He said the two men, aged 32 and 35, were close friends and shared a house together in Nakara.

The men were both Tamil asylum seekers and arrived in Australia from Sri Lanka five years ago by boat.

It is understood both men had been in immigration detention in Darwin but had been living in the community since 2012.

The men died when the Toyota FJ Cruiser they were travelling in lost control and slammed into a tree outside Dripstone Middle School.

Neighbours who went to investigate found two dead bodies on the ground.

A third man, 26, survived the crash and was taken to Royal Darwin Hospital with minor injuries.

A police investigation involving the major crash unit is now underway, with officers trying to determine if drugs and alcohol were involved.

Source: ABC