Water Tragedies Ignite ‘Horror Start’ to 2022
Seven people have drowned in Victoria since Christmas Day after only one week into the New Year. Life Saving Victoria general manager, Liam Krige said it was an “absolutely horror start to 2022”, Lifesavers across the state have undertaken 44 successful water rescues in three days, which could have had different outcomes, had help not been close at hand.
After two difficult years, people are wanting to cut loose, enjoying summer water activities, which needs to be tempered with caution and an appreciation of dangers associated with water pursuits.
- A woman drowned after being washed into the sea while fishing at San Remo two days prior to New Year’s Day.
- A toddler died three days after being pulled from pond in Footscray Park, a day before New Year’s Day.
- Two other drowning incidents occurred within three days of the above, before 2021 ended.
- A seven-year-old boy and a 35-year-old man died in separate water accidents in Victoria over the first weekend of the year, as a spate of drownings signalled an “absolutely horror start” to the year for emergency authorities.
- Police search and rescue divers found a body, believed to be the boy, on Sunday morning after he went missing while swimming with a group of four people in the Snowy River at Jarrahmond, near Orbost in the state’s east on Saturday 1st.
- Emergency services were called to Princetown just east of the mouth of the Gellibrand River in Victoria’s south-west at 10.40am on Sunday 2nd, 2022 after three swimmers got into difficulty. Two men flying a local private helicopter helped rescue three swimmers and began CPR on a 35-year-old man, but he died at the scene.
