A teenage boy has died a day after he was pulled from the Hawkesbury River north-west of Sydney as the national summer drowning toll approaches 60.
Emergency services were called to the river at Sackville on Monday about midday and the unresponsive 16-year-old was pulled from the water.
Members of the public performed CPR on the teenager before paramedics arrived and stabilised him. He was airlifted to Westmead hospital in a critical condition and died on Tuesday. New South Wales police were investigating the drowning.
Authorities have meanwhile scaled back a water search at Batemans Bay on the NSW south coast after a man went missing while snorkelling on Monday afternoon.
A search on land continued into Tuesday night with police confirming divers would attend the search site on Wednesday.
The 39-year-old man went missing from Richmond Beach in the Murramarang national park, north of Batemans Bay.
The man reportedly entered the water from the rocks to go snorkelling. When he failed to return and could not be located, authorities were notified.
Steve Pearce, the chief executive of Surf Life Saving NSW, said a combination of difficult surf conditions and people’s enthusiasm for the beach after a year dominated by the Covid-19 pandemic had resulted in a spike in drowning deaths.
“We’ve had such a large swell over the past four weeks, and those big swell periods have changed the dynamics and the seascape floor of many beaches,” he told Guardian Australia. “It’s actually formed up rips in some locations that predominantly haven’t had rips before or really exacerbated existing rips.”
Human remains were also found near Port MacDonnell in South Australia on Tuesday close to where a snorkeller disappeared in a suspected shark attack last week.
Police said the remains were yet to be identified but Duncan Craw’s family released a statement.
“While we may never know for sure, based on the evidence we do have, we now believe it is most likely Duncan suffered a medical episode long before the arrival of the shark,” his stepsister, Andrea Hamblin, said.
Pearce said NSW lifesavers were working hard to ensure people were aware of the dangers posed by waterways.
“Just today, our lifesavers did over 200 rescues up and down the coastline, and 400 preventative actions,” he said.
“If you’re heading down to the beach, just please ensure that you swim at a patrolled location. All of the drowning fatalities that we’ve seen this year have all occurred at unpatrolled locations. We’ve never had a drowning between the red and yellow flags.”
According to Royal Life Saving, there have been 58 drowning deaths reported in Australia this summer compared to 45 this time in 2020. That toll does not include the 16-year-old’s death.