RALPH BAN­WARIE

An ex­cur­sion to Ba­lan­dra beach on Sat­ur­day by mem­bers of the Arneaud fam­i­ly of Pleas­antville end­ed in tragedy when a mem­ber drowned while bathing.

Po­lice re­port­ed around 3:20 pm on Sat­ur­day, 27-year-old Ithiel Arneaud was bathing ap­prox­i­mate­ly 25 me­tres off­shore when he be­gan ex­pe­ri­enc­ing dif­fi­cul­ties, start­ed shout­ing for as­sis­tance and sub­merged un­der the wa­ter.

Sev­er­al per­sons went to his aid, where he was as­sist­ed and brought to the shore un­re­spon­sive.

At­tempts were made to re­sus­ci­tate him, how­ev­er, they proved fu­tile. Short­ly there­after, the am­bu­lance ser­vices ar­rived but Arneaud was al­ready dead.