Hero drown­ing vic­tim, Ryan Mc Guire, 17, would have spent his first day to­day en­rolled at the Trinidad and To­ba­go Civil­ian Con­ser­va­tion Corps (CCC) to learn the elec­tri­cal trade.

In­stead, his rel­a­tives are mourn­ing his death.

On Sun­day, at his home at Build­ing 1A, Orop­une Cir­cu­lar, Orop­une Gar­dens friends, rel­a­tives and well-wish­ers were with his fam­i­ly giv­ing them the much-need­ed love and sup­port in their time of grief.

Mc Guire, who drowned in Tyri­co Bay on Sat­ur­day sac­ri­ficed his own life to save two oth­ers—a 17-year-old girl and her nine-year-old broth­er, who both faced dif­fi­cul­ties in the wa­ter.

Mc Guire, 17, a mem­ber of the Orop­une Po­lice Youth Club is now be­ing de­scribed as a hero for his brave and self­less ac­tions.

The teenag­er was part of a group of young peo­ple in­clud­ing mem­bers of the po­lice youth club, who went on an ex­cur­sion to the beach.

Ac­cord­ing to po­lice re­ports, at about 4 pm the broth­er and sis­ter were swept away by the cur­rents. Mc Guire, who saw what was hap­pen­ing went to their aid and whilst bring­ing them to safe­ty, he went un­der and was in­stead swept away by the strong cur­rents.

The two were fur­ther as­sist­ed by oth­er swim­mers, who im­me­di­ate­ly al­so combed the sea in search of Mc Guire.

Af­ter 20 min­utes, Mc Guire was brought to shore and at­tend­ed to by a doc­tor, para­medics, and a coast guard of­fi­cer who were all on the beach.

At­tempts were made to re­vive him, how­ev­er, sad­ly, there was no re­sponse. His body was re­moved by un­der­tak­ers to the Port-of-Spain mor­tu­ary.

Speak­ing with the Guardian Me­dia, Mc Guire’s broth­er Roneil, 21 and sis­ter Ronel, 22, said he was the third of five chil­dren for their moth­er, who they said was very dis­traught over his trag­ic death.

Roneil said he was at home when his moth­er called him and told him what hap­pened, “at first I thought she was jok­ing. I got weak. I felt re­lieved in my mind in the way he died as he was try­ing to help oth­ers but he is my broth­er and I will miss him so much.”

Ronel said she last saw her broth­er at about 9.30 am on Sat­ur­day as she was leav­ing for work, “I re­mem­bered him play­ing a game on his phone with a smile on his face. I closed the door and went on my way. My broth­er was the most lov­ing and kind per­son and he was very ex­cit­ed to start CCC.”

Cpl Kevin Greenidge of the Orop­une Po­lice Youth Club and Cpl Cyl­lan Gil­lead who were there dur­ing our vis­it de­scribed him as an “ex­em­plary youth.”

“We worked very hard with him and he was now open­ing out like a flower. He was do­ing so well that he got a mon­e­tary re­ward of two poly­mer $100 bills and was very ex­cit­ed and proud of it, “ Greenidge said.

“He had a very hum­ble spir­it and was al­ways there to help oth­ers. Our hearts are bro­ken. It’s very sad but he is our hero, “ he added.

On its Face­book page, the Oro­poune Po­lice Youth Club, on Sat­ur­day night, post­ed:

“It is with a heavy heart and tear­ful eyes that I am let­ting res­i­dents know that Ryan Mc Guire passed by drown­ing...he was lim­ing with friends at Tyri­co Bay..when two of them got in­to dif­fi­cul­ty..he went to as­sist and paid the ul­ti­mate price...con­do­lences go out to his bi­o­log­i­cal and his OPYC fam­i­ly.”

An au­top­sy is ex­pect­ed to be con­duct­ed to­day at the Foren­sic Sci­ence Cen­tre in St James.