18-Month-Old Child Pulled From Pool
Posted August 9, 2007 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
It’s the kind of tragedy that can so easily happen in the summertime. An 18-month old baby was rushed to a Stouffville hospital Thursday afternoon after being discovered in his family’s pool in Markham.
Investigators say the child somehow slipped past a house filled with other children and adults, went out through the back deck and crawled toward the pool. When his foster father came out to look for him just after 12:30pm, he made the horrifying discovery – the little boy lying face down in the water. Sirens screamed their way to 83 Pringle Ave. near Highway 7, where crews found the child without vital signs. They managed to revive him and sent him to hospital. He was stabilized and airlifted to Hamilton’s McMaster Children’s Hospital for more specialized treatment.
Police believe the incident is an accident, but they’re still probing the sequence of events that led to the tragedy and why no one knew where the toddler was after he went missing. The residence is home to several other foster children.
“It’s very shocking and unfortunate,” said neighbour Emma Malcolm. “I had a pool growing up and I had younger sisters, five years younger than me, and you have to be there constantly keeping everything shut.”
“These are good neighbours, it’s an accident,” adds another area resident.
While backyard pools can be a lot of fun, parents have to be sure to take extreme precautions to protect their kids. Drownings are the leading cause of accidental death for children between the ages of 1 and 4. According to Safe Kids Canada, 42 percent of all children between 5 and 14 who have drowned in the past ten years didn’t have an adult watching them at the time.
