Man drowns in Square Time Cafe & Lounge dam in Pretoria East
Emergency workers said a young man drowned at the Square Time Cafe & Lounge dam on Friday evening.
A young man drowned at the Square Time Cafe & Lounge dam on Friday evening.
His body was recovered by police divers, COT Fire and Rescue, and GEMS water on Saturday morning.
The Gauteng Emergency Medical Services spokesperson JP von Benecke said the first call that attended the scene was Netcare911 who found the man submerged for more than 20 minutes at the time of their arrival.
Von Benecke said upon establishing that, the team had to immediately change its mission from that of rescue to that of search and recovery.
“The search continued well into the night and the last sweep was completed just before midnight.
“We deployed various search techniques and equipment including grid sweeps using wading poles, submerged divers, and our drones,” he added.
On the decision why the search had to be called off at midnight, Von Benecke said that was due to the extreme challenges the divers encountered such as thick water grass that was underneath the dam.
“The thick water grass entangles you as you move through it, and there were also lots of fishing line and very deep muddy silt.”
He, however, said the team resumed the search early on Saturday from where they left off last night, adding that the results was positive as they managed to pull up the man’s body a few meters from their last search grid at around at 9:45 just as the SAPS airwing helicopter joined the search.
“We do not want to speculate as to the reason why the young man went into the water at this stage out of respect for his family and the ongoing investigation into the circumstances that lead to his death,” he concluded.
Furthermore, Von Benecke sent his heartfelt condolences to the bereaved family, also extending his gratitude to fellow team members who helped in the operations search and recovery.
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