The bodies of two students who drowned at the Aberdeen beach on Sunday were yesterday morning retrieved from the sea.
Paul Marrah (22) of 11c Cockeril south and Emmanuel Samura (20) of 20 Cockeril South had gone to the Aberdeen beach with their colleagues on Sunday to have fun.
Paul was an SSS3 student on holidays from Kabala and Emmanuel a JSS3 student of the Prince of Wales. They drowned at around 5pm.
According to eye witness accounts, the diseased and friends first started playing on the beach until they decided to swim. The eye witness revealed that when the diseased and friends decided to go and swim, they were advised by the fishermen not to do so as the sea was not stable.
The witness said the advice was not adhered to and off they swam in to the Aberdeen beach.
Whilst swimming, the eye witness continued, one of the diseased went afar and realizing that he needed help, the other too swam further to help him but both became prey to those living in the sea.
According to the fishermen, they stated that had an alarm been raised about the drowning of the diseased, they would have swam to save their lives.
Those who later knew what was happening blamed the colleagues of the diseased who abandoned them to drown without raising alarm and also for running away without informing anybody.
Mrs. Sajor Daramy who is the aunt of Paul Marrah however expressed disappointment about the lack of rescue officials at the beach. “There were no rescue workers at the beach. The two men would not have died if someone had attempted to save them” she said.
She said every weekend; hundreds of young men and women flock to the beaches of Freetown for different exercises. She stated that; “until government provides rescue mechanisms at the beaches, otherwise, many people will continue to lose their lives this way.”
She expressed appreciation for the fishermen around that area. She said if it were not for the effort of the fishermen, the corpses would either have been eaten up by fishes or not seen.
The almost decomposed bodies were yesterday morning taken to the Connaught Hospital Mortuary for mandatory post mortem examination
By Ishmael Bayoh and Abdul Samba Brima
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