THIRTEEN people drowned over the New Year’s weekend in Zululand, three of them small children.
Empangeni Police Search and Rescue divers were called to separate incidents at beaches, rivers and lakes between 31 December and 2 January to recover the bodies of drowning victims.
On 31 December, the unit was dispatched to Pongola where a nine-year-old boy drowned near the Jozini dam wall.
Another nine-year-old boy drowned on 1 January in Hluhluwe, but community members recovered the body before the divers arrived on the scene.
The rest of New Year’s day was fraught with tragedy.
Three people, a 13-year-old girl, a 31-year-old woman as well as a 17-year-old male drowned while swimming in Lake Sibaya near Mbazwana.
According to witness reports, the teenage girl was struggling in the water and the boy swam out to help her. He also struggled and at that point the woman went to assist them, but all three drowned.
While divers were searching the murky depths of Lake Sibaya, drowning incidents at Bay Hall and Pelican Island in Richards Bay unfolded.
ORS Border Control divers stepped in to recover the body of a 30-year-old male who drowned at Pelican Island, while NSRI rescue crews recovered and resuscitated an eight-year-old boy at Bay Hall. His sister (12), however, was declared dead a few minutes after arriving at Netcare The Bay Hospital despite intensive efforts by the NSRI crew to resuscitate her using CPR.
Later that afternoon, three men were reported missing in separate incidents at Njabulo beach in St Lucia.
Without any clear indication of where the men – aged 18, 25 and 31 – were last seen, police divers could not recover their bodies.
Body parts have since been washing up on the beach every day and DNA testing would be required to identify the remains.
A young child’s body also washed up on the beach at Sodwana Bay, as well the body of a young male in Lalanek near Mbazwane.
The circumstances surrounding these drownings are not clear at this stage.
Strange twist
While members of the unit were travelling back to Empangeni they received yet another call, this time as a result of a report filed with police of a 17-year-old girl who had gone missing in Amatikulu.
Her family had last seen her swimming in the estuary.
At this point it was past midnight and divers decided to delay the start of the search until first light.
At around 8am on 2 January the unit discovered the body of a man in his mid-twenties. Community members managed to identify the man whose family had not realised he was in Amathikulu or that he had gone missing.
Warrant Officer Waldo Herbst, a member of the diving team, has urged people to take care when swimming.
‘Consuming alcohol and swimming usually does not end well,’ he said.
‘We can only urge that people approach water cautiously, and to keep watch over their relatives and children.’
