It was a three-year-old boy who raised the alarm that his brother and sister had fallen into an icy stream behind their home, sparking a massive rescue operation.
Unfortunately, it was too late, and a boy, 8 and a girl, 6 were declared dead on Monday after they fell through the ice and died in a poor rural area in central Romania.
Police and child protection authorities are now investigating the deaths of two children and are deciding whether to remove a 3-year-old from the couple after it emerged that two other children from the family had died from pneumonia in recent months.
Images broadcast on TVR Info showed the family lived in a ramshackle home in a poor rural area in the county of Sibiu.
The children’s father, Tibiu Magat, said the siblings had been playing in the backyard of the house and remained unsupervised before their younger brother raised the alarm. The mother said they had been unsupervised for ‘one or two hours.’
“The children were playing outside. I put firewood in the house to make food for the children,” their mother was quoted as saying by Observator News. The three-year-old boy told his mother and that his brother and sister had gone to gather some branches.
Firefighters, divers, ambulances and a SMURD emergency services helicopter from the neighboring county of Brașov aided by the local community took part in the rescue effort.
The operation lasted more than an hour in difficult conditions. Rescuers found the girl first, and immediately began resuscitation maneuvers, but to no avail. About an hour later, the body of her 9-year-old brother was discovered in a beaver dam, about 200 meters from where the two children fell into the water.
Responding to the tragedy, the General Inspectorate for Emergency Situations (IGSU) on Tuesday urged parents not to leave their children unattended near lakes, rivers or frozen ponds, following the deaths of the two children who fell through the ice and died.
“How many more tragedies do need to happen to truly understand the danger of frozen waters?” a statement said.
“DO NOT leave children unattended near lakes, rivers or frozen ponds. Talk to them about the risks and explain to them that ice is NOT a playground,” the message read.
Police have opened a criminal case to establish the exact circumstances of Monday’s tragedy. The General Directorate of Social Assistance and Child Protection Sibiu is also carrying out an investigation to decide what measures are necessary in the case of the 3-year-old child, the remaining child.
Authorities said two other children from the same family died from pneumonia in recent months but the family was not monitored by child protection institutions.
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