The number of water-related deaths during the UK's recent heatwave has risen to 15, after the bodies of two teenage boys were recovered in Kent and Oxford. Emergency workers recovered the body of a 14-year-old boy from the River Thames near Donnington Bridge, Oxford, at about 5.30pm on Wednesday. Thames Valley police said the boy's family had been informed and that his death was being treated as “unexplained but not suspicious”.
The body of another boy was recovered from a pond in Swanscombe, Kent. His death was also not being treated as suspicious. There have been several similar deaths thought to be linked to outdoor swimming in the record-breaking heatwave, during which temperatures climbed to 35.1C at Heathrow and Kew Gardens, in west London, on Tuesday.
The Royal Life Saving Society UK has issued a plea for members of the public to “stop and think” before getting into the water. “Warmer weather unfortunately sees an increase in accidental drownings,” it said. The hot weather is expected to continue in the coming days, before easing over the weekend, according to the Met Office.
A yellow heat health alert has been issued by the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) for eastern and south-east England and London, running from 4pm on Thursday until 8pm on Saturday. The UKHSA said it meant water-related incidents could increase, and warned of the risks from cold-water shock and drowning.
Recent incidents include the deaths of Declan Sawyer, 15, at Swanholme Lakes, Lincoln, on Sunday; a 72-year-old woman at West Angle Bay beach in Pembrokeshire, Wales; a 13-year-old boy, understood to be Reco Puttock, at Leadbeater Dam, near Halifax; a teenage girl at Kingsbury Water Park, Warwickshire; a man in his 60s at Tregirls Beach, near Padstow; a teenager at Rother Valley Country Park, Rotherham; a teenage boy at Hawley Lake, on the border of Hampshire and Surrey; Junior Slater, 12, in the River Ribble, Lancashire; and a 17-year-old boy at Pickmere Lake, in Marston, Northwich.
