An 8-year-old girl was sucked into a “malfunctioning” pipe at a Texas hotel pool over the weekend and was found dead inside the tube more than half a day later, authorities said.
The tragic incident occurred Saturday at the DoubleTree in Houston as the victim was swimming in the “Lazy River Style” pool with his family. the policeman said.
The girl was initially reported missing, but According to KTRKTV.
“Did she wander? Did someone take her or what? So, anyway, we mobilized a lot of people,” said a police officer called to help find the child. said Tim Miller, founder of EquuSearch, Texas. “There were people actually searching everywhere, outside, different rooms.”
Footage from the pool’s security camera later revealed that the child had gone underwater and never resurfaced.
The outlet said her body was discovered after the pool was drained and a camera was fed into one of the pipes.
“We set up a pole about 20 feet away and saw her little hands and parts of her body, so we called the fire department,” Miller said.
“[It] “It looks like there is a pump in place now, but it probably failed because the open pipe she entered was pushing water out,” he said.
“And right next to that pipe, there was another pipe that had a big plastic filter-like screen in the front that was actually supposed to suck in the water. So, last night, I learned quite a bit and learned everything. I know there was one speculation from someone who was saying that the pump was wired incorrectly. In other words, it felt like sucking instead of pushing.
“She was wedged in there very, very tightly,” Miller said. “I don’t think she decided, ‘She’s going to swim here and she’s going to see what’s here.’
“Many of us had to wipe tears from our eyes,” he said of the search team. “This is one of the saddest things we’ve seen in a while.”
It took about 13 hours to find and rescue the girl.
This shocking incident is not the first time a child has died in a swimming pool. In 2006, 6-year-old Abigail Taylor died after part of her intestinal tract was torn apart by suction from a drain at a golf club in Minnesota. According to NBC News.
The following year, Zachary Cohn, 6, the son of a wealthy Connecticut millionaire, died when his arm was sucked into a drainpipe that may have been missing a safety grate at his family’s pool.
