11 students perished and 10 were saved on a school trip to clean up a river in Indonesia

[ASEAN NOW Content Team]

 

Officials stated on Saturday that eleven kids perished and ten others were rescued during a school outing for a river cleanup in Indonesia's West Java Province (Oct 16).

On Friday, 150 pupils from an Islamic junior high school were engaging in a cleanup along the banks of the Cileueur river when 21 of them slipped into the water, according to local officials.

 

"There was no flash flood because of the fine weather," said Deden Ridwansyah, chief of the Bandung Search and Rescue Office.
"The drowning children were gripping each other's hands.
"One of them went down, and the rest followed," Ridwansyah explained.

Residents in the area and a rescue crew were able to save ten students, who were taken to a local hospital.

Two of the pupils were in critical condition, according to AFP.

Rescuers searched for victims using large orange inflatable rafts, and all students were found when the search ended on Friday night.

 

The students did not appear to be wearing any flotation gear.
According to some stories, they were attempting to cross the river, which is popular for rafting and inner tubing.