12-year-old drowns in Snake Bar swamp

A TWELVE-year-old student of Markham Road Primary School in Lae reportedly drowned in the Snake Bar swamp in Lae on Wednesday.
Michael Miopa,Chuave, Chimbu, uncle of the deceased, Toane Samson, said his nephew was with his other two classmates – Daiz Gene, also from Chuave, and Arial Gumamboi from East Elimbari, Chimbu were fishing at the time of his death.
He said the three boys were out catching fish in the swamp at around 4pm when the incident happened.
He said poor Toane was sick that day when his two friends asked him to go fishing.
Toane was fishing 10m away from Arial and Daiz, who were busy cleaning the fish they caught, when he felt so dizzy and fell off the bank into the swamp.
It was a few minutes later when Arial and Daiz realise what happened and dived in to rescue but they were too late to save him.
He was pronounced dead at the Angau Memorial Hospital at 5pm.
Another uncle, Mathew, said Toane was residing with him at 1-Mile, Boundary Road, while attending Markham Road Primary School.
With the death of his nephew, he warned parents to look after their children and not to let them out on their own to places where anytjing could happen without supervision.