Authorities have recovered the bodies of two Texas teens who drowned while trying to rescue a child from a river.
According to CBS affiliate KHOU, the tragedy occurred Sunday at the Trinity River in Liberty County, about 50 miles away from Houston. Jaerson Alvarez, 18, and Wilmer Alexi Rodriguez, 17, reportedly jumped in the river to help Abel Castellanos save his 5-year-old daughter, who was struggling in the water. Though Castellanos, 25, managed to pull the girl to safety, the teens—who were unrelated to the father and daughter—never resurfaced.
Texas officials began looking for the teens Sunday evening, but said they stalled the search because the waters were too rough to continue. They resumed Monday morning and found Alvarez and Rodriguez's bodies along the SH 105 bridge in Moss Hill.
"This river, at this location, has claimed many lives over the past years," Liberty County Sheriff’s Capt. Ken DeFoor told reporters this week. "We constantly advise the public not to swim here. The river, on the surface, looks very placid, but there is an undercurrent all the time in this river. The bottom is extremely irregular. You can go from waist-deep water and step off into a hole that is 40-50 feet deep."
He went to warn the public about the dangers of the river, and advised them to stay out of it.
"Over the years, there have been numerous very-large wooden signs posted here warning of the dangers of swimming here, but the public keeps tearing them down, breaking them up and using them for campfire wood," DeFoor added. "So our warnings are verbal: Don’t try to swim here."
Castellanos was reportedly airlifted to the hospital after ingesting a large amount of water. His condition was unknown at the time of DeFoor's statements.
