8-year-old girl’s body found after four days

LYDENBURG – Eight-year-old Charmain Mashego tragically drowned after playing with her friends in the Spekboom River on Saturday afternoon.

Unfortunately, according to a source, no parental supervision took place. Mashego was staying with her family in a rural area near the river and therefore had easy access to it.

“Police were informed of the incident at about 16:30 Saturday afternoon. A search was scheduled for the next day which included the provincial diving squad, local police, the K9 unit an N3 Fire and Rescue,” said Deon Broekman.

Two K9 Search and Rescue dogs called Lara and Bertus also bravely joined the team in search of the body.

After no luck Sunday, the search teams called it a day and continued on Monday. “Various circumstances including the strong current made it almost impossible for us to continue that day. A helicopter was summoned from Nelspruit to assist us. The teams strategised before continuing the next day,” said Broekman.

After the police helicopter surveyed the area, the search and rescue teams took to the river once again. Unfortunately the hard work had not payed off and the search had to be continued on Tuesday. Some members could not have carried on with the search for Mashego as they were called to other drowning sites which had occurred in Secunda and Schoemansdal.

The body of the eight-year-old was recovered on Tuesday at about 11:00 approximately two kilometres from where the incident occurred after it had been in the river for four days. “The family was devastated. We are grateful to have had the opportunity to help,” said Broekman.

It now seems as if these type of drownings regularly occur. The latest statistics from the emergency medical services provider, Netcare 911, indicate an interesting trend. “Since the beginning of December, Netcare 911 has received more calls relating to drowning and water-related incidents from the country’s inland provinces than it has for the coastal areas,” reads a statement.

According to Peter Feurstein, Netcare 911’s regional coastal operations manager, many of the calls received from the coastal provinces, involve children and resulted from freshwater sources such as public and private swimming pools, rural dams and rivers. There is also a noticeable trend in terms of the age differences of the children involved in these incidences.

“There seems to be a definite distinction between inland and coastal incidents. Coastal incidents seem to involve the age group of 10 to 18 more predominantly while, inland, the greatest number of incidents involve two to 8 years,” says Feurstein.