Four grade-eight schoolgirls from the north-central Vietnamese province of Nghe An drowned while bathing in a local lake on Monday afternoon, an official confirmed, adding that their bodies were found in the evening of the same day.
The deadly incident happened at around 4:00 pm on the day, according to Ngo Sy Cuong, chairman of Nghia Loc Commune in Nghia Dan District, Nghe An.
A group of six local eighth graders went for a bath at a lake in the commune around that time, Cuong said.
All six children were swept into the deep water and sank, but only two of them managed to escape.
Rescuers came shortly after, before recovering all four bodies by 6:00 pm on the day.
The lake where the students drowned is a two-meter-wide irrigation reservoir for agricultural production in Nghia Loc Commune, with many parts of it as deep as more than three meters, prompting local authorities to erect warning signs against swimming there.
More than 2,000 children aged under 16 years in Vietnam lose their lives every year due to drowning, the World Health Organization cited an estimate in 2020.
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