Friends and former classmates of Christian Bell, 18, are remembering him as a friendly, outgoing young man who was inquisitive by nature.
Bell drowned on June 12, 2004, when he attempted to swim across an inlet. Police divers recovered his body a day later halfway across the river.
According to police, Bell was with friends when he tried to swim 250 yards across the inlet. "He made it halfway when he started getting in trouble," police said. "One of his friends tried to help, but he started getting pulled under. They swam in a straight line, but hypothermia may have set in."
The cold water, which was probably about 30 degrees lower than body temperature, may have started to shut down circulation in the swimmers' arms and legs. Police received a call about a swimmer in trouble at 3:01 p.m., and a police dive team arrived, along with police and fire departments in a massive search effort.
The rescue effort became a recovery effort two hours after Bell was last seen in the water, according to police. The cause of death was drowning. The incident prompted police to remind swimmers about safety rules. "It's important to swim with a partner," he said. "Distances are deceiving when you look across water."
Help Came Too Late
The scene of the tragedy.
A nine-year-old girl drowned in a backyard pool of a Scarborough home on July 14, 2004, despite a neighbour's heroic attempt to save her. Toronto police responded just after 3 p.m. to a 911 call on a girl who was pulled out of the water at a home on Blue Eagle Tr., near Midland and Finch Aves. She was pronounced dead at Scarborough Grace hospital less than two hours later.
The girl was playing in the shallow end with two other children, who lived in the house, when she slipped on a "fairly steep grade" that led to the deep end, said Toronto Police Detective Scott Whittemore of 42 Division. One of the children, an eight-year-old boy, alerted the drowned girl's grandmother, who was "steps away" in the house, Whittemore said.
None of the house's occupants could swim, he said, adding that the death was accidental. "There was an adult in the house, but (the girl) slipped so quickly that nobody noticed her going in except the small boy," Whittemore said. "He was the one who alerted everyone."
Yuning Liu, 32, was at his house next door when he heard a commotion coming from their backyard. He looked out his bedroom window to the adjacent backyard - which seemed normal - so he wasn't too concerned.
A few minutes later, he heard a frantic knock. The grandmother from next door started speaking Cantonese, which he couldn't understand because he knew only Mandarin, but he knew something was wrong.
"The way she was talking, I thought it was urgent," Liu said. When he followed the grandmother to the backyard, he saw the girl at the bottom of the pool, face-up in the eight-foot deep end. He pulled her out, but she wasn't breathing, Liu said. He called 911 and, with his basic training and the operator's help, Liu began applying CPR. "I thought there was still hope because water came out."
The girl, an only child, was in the pool for nearly five minutes before Liu tried to save her, police estimate. The first ambulance arrived on the scene about seven minutes after the call, said Bruce England of Emergency Medical Services.
Liu said he asked the grandmother why she didn't call 911 before she knocked on his door. He said the grandmother told him she couldn't speak English and she thought that the operator wouldn't understand Cantonese. But an EMS official said 911 operators have on-call translators around the clock. They also use an international language service in case they don't have anybody who speaks a language.
When told that the girl had died, Liu hit the back of his head against the wall and tears welled up.
"I wish if I came five minutes earlier, I could save her," Liu said. "I feel very sad today."
Kids Survive, Parents Drown
A young husband and wife from the Mosquito Lake First Nation died July 6, 2004 in a boating accident as their two young children and another boy looked on.
The Saskatchewan couple's five-year-old son and four-year-old daughter, as well as an 11-year-old boy who was related to them, were wearing life-jackets at the time of the accident and survived.
RCMP say a rented paddleboat tipped over about 500 metres from the shore of Turtle Lake.
Witnesses who saw the boat capsize rescued the three children, but it is believed that the overturning boat hit the adults on the head.
The bodies of 28-year-old Perry Bruno and 23-year-old Tanya Starchief were later pulled from the lake.
"Initial investigation indicates that the paddleboat was equipped with lifejackets for all the occupants, and that the children were wearing theirs at the time the boat overturned," said RCMP Cpl. Brian Jones.
"The adults were not wearing lifejackets when they were removed from the water," he added.
The police investigation continues.
A little boy fights for his life after falling into the river. Hundreds of similar tragedies happen every year across North America.
Even While Supervised...
On June 20, 2004, a seven-year-old boy was found floating in the deep end of the Iroquois Ridge Community Centre pool in Oakville, just moments before a one-hour party was to end at about 5:45 p.m.
Even a well-supervised public pool can become the site of tragedy.
Halton police have indicated they believe the youngster drowned sometime during the party, which was attended by 34 other children.
Town officials said that lifeguards who were at the scene are receiving grief counselling and that the dead boy was among the guests but not the birthday child.
"There were five lifeguards and a supervisor at the scene. They are all feeling pretty traumatized over this incident," said Domenic Lunardo, Oakville's Commissioner of Community Services. "Our deepest thoughts of condolences go out to the family of this young boy," he said.
Police have also said several parents were at the pool when the tragedy occurred, although it's not known whether the victim's family was in attendance. "One of the parents supervising the party noticed the boy floating in the deep end of the pool," Halton Sergeant Jeff Corey said.
Police said that parents immediately removed the child from the water and another parent and a lifeguard performed CPR. The child was pronounced dead at Oakville Trafalgar Memorial Hospital. The pool, located in the centre at 1051 Glenashton Dr., near Eighth Line, had been rented for the birthday party and no other swimmers were allowed in the swimming area at the time the celebration was taking place.
Hikers need to take the necessary precautions to ensure their safe return.
Two paddle boating tragedies in one week illustrate the need to wear a PFD on every type of watercraft.
"It's Like a Nightmare"
The body of a four-year-old girl was found when a paddle boat was run over by a speedboat was pulled from a Quebec lake on July 6, 2004. The girl's aunt, who was in the boat when the collision occurred, said the cries of her nephew, screaming for his missing sister, will haunt her for some time.
"I cried a lot," Brigitte Marion Vinette, 29, said, as police divers searched Lac Vert, near Montpellierer, Que., for Sandrine Brisson.
"I feel responsible. I can't imagine losing a child. We were responsible for them," said Ms. Marion Vinette, explaining that she and her mother, Monique Marion, 52, had been baby-sitting Sandrine and her seven-year-old brother, Jeremie, when the accident occurred.
The two women and children had planned to spend the afternoon at the Marion family cottage, about 110 kilometres northeast of Ottawa, while the children's parents, Norman and Christine Brisson, spent the day at their own nearby cottage.
Beautiful Lac Vert, Quebec, is the scene of a tragic accident.
They were only about 100 metres from the dock when Ms. Marion Vinette spotted a motorboat pulling a waterskier headed straight for them. "At first I thought he was teasing and wanted to splash water on us. I said to my Mom I thought the waterskier would hit us. Then I realized it wasn't the skier, it was the boat that would hit us. "That is all Ms. Marion Vinette can remember before hearing a loud bang and being thrown into the water."
When she surfaced, she realized the paddle boat had not been overturned and her mother was still on it, albeit with a badly mangled leg that would require surgery. Jeremie was floating beneath the paddle boat, but Sandrine was nowhere to be seen.
"I screamed twice, 'Sandrine, Sandrine.' I was crying out 'Sandrine,' and Jeremie started crying, 'I want my sister.' " Neighbours who heard the crash immediately dialed 911 and rushed out in their boats to take them ashore.
Mrs. Marion was taken to a hospital and later transferred to Hull for an operation that would involve inserting two steel pins into her legs. Claude Marion, Sandrine's grandfather, refused to go with his wife to the hospital. "Poor Sandrine, she's in the water all alone," Ms. Marion Vinette remembers him saying as he stood on the dock looking out onto the water.
Lieutenant Stephane Nadeau, who works with the Ottawa fire service and is a cousin of Mr. Brisson, was a member of the three-person dive team that recovered the body. He said that during the search effort, he struggled to detach himself from the fact that he was searching for a relative.
"She was a cute little girl, just a child. It's like a nightmare. It's always in the back of your mind that you want to help find her and you'd like to find her as soon as possible, but the one person who finds her will have to live with it for the rest of their lives," Lieut. Nadeau said.
When she was finally found, the little girl was placed in a body bag and taken ashore to tearful parents who identified her. "They said that she looked very good -- like she was asleep," said the girl's great-grandfather, Allan Levere.
His wife, Lucie, said the last time she saw Sandrine was at the grocery store just days ago. "When she saw me in the store, she just ran to me. Everyone will remember her as a little girl who didn't ask for anything but kisses and hugs."
Dangerous boating behaviour can result in injury and death. Be Safe. Boat Smart!
Mountain Conditions Turn Deadly
Two brothers went for an afternoon hike on St. Mary's Glacier over the weekend and one did not return home. Bob Pare, the surviving brother talked about the tragedy as a frightening reminder of how quickly conditions can change in the mountains.
"It was three days from June. I didn't expect blizzard conditions," said Bob Pare.
Pare, 20, thought he knew the Colorado mountains. He had hiked St. Mary's Glacier before and thought that at 11,000 feet that he and his 16-year-old brother Greg would get caught in the rain. Instead, it was a driving blizzard and the two simply couldn't see to make their way down.
"It's not that we were disoriented and confused and that kind of thing. You couldn't see 20 feet in front of you. When you're trying to use landscape as guidance and stuff, and you get 20 feet from the side of a mountain - they all look the same," Pare said.
So the brothers made a shelter against a rock to wait out the storm until morning. But the snow kept coming.
St. Mary's Glacier appears serene in the spring, but its conditions can turn deadly in an instant.
"There was no 'We're not gonna make it.' It was just, 'We're gonna rest here. Wait the night out and get up in the morning and go,' " Pare said.
"He kept asking me if I was OK the whole time because I was shaking really hard and stuff and breathing hard, and he wasn't shaking as much or breathing as hard," Pare said of his brother.
They were huddled together, talked and tried to stay awake.
"About five in the morning he started mumbling like he was just dreaming. I tried waking him up and stuff but there was no rousing him. Then I knew he was going into severe hypothermia," Pare said.
At daylight, Pare went searching for help and rescuers heard him. He suffered severe frostbite on his toes and knees but his brother was not so lucky. He did not survive.
This tragedy is a reminder for hikers to always prepare for the worst weather conditions and to dress accordingly.
A search crew scans the water, looking for signs of life.
