A 16-year-old Colombian lad was drowned in the Río Genil where it passes through the city of Granada. The current was torrential because of the thaw in the Sierra Nevada.

When the lad suggested cooling off in the river, one of his friends told him not to even think about it, warning, “tomorrow we will be in the newspapers because we will be dead.” He decided to enter, regardless.

No sooner than he had entered the water, he began to cry for help as he was dragged towards a whirlpool, formed by the turbulence caused by the volume of water coming down the river. Despite the danger to his own life, one of his companions entered the water but was soon in difficulties himself and had it not been for the third lad, who used a branch to drag him out further down stream, he too would have perished too.

The Guardia Civil finally recovered the body of the drowned teenage two kilometers further down stream.

There are notices stating that bathing is prohibited – especially during the thaw – but this does not keep people from endangering their own lives… and those that try to help them.

(News: Metropolitan Granada, Andalucia)