Two girls aged 13 and 14 have died in Dowa after Kasangadzi river bank crumbled and fell on them as they were collecting sand.
The girls have been identified as Eunice Chibwe (13) and Alibentry Katambo (14) both from Chikanda village in the area of Traditional Authority Dzoole in Dowa District.
Mponela police deputy publicist, sergeant Macpatson Msadala said the incident occurred on Friday October 2, 2020, at around noon at Chikanda village.
He said the river bank in the area is basically sandy and people flock to the river to harvest the sand in order to earn a livelihood after selling it.
“On that particular day, the girls were five (5) in total, one of them a sibling to Eunice, named Joana Chibwe (15). They went to Kasangadzi River for their usual task of collecting sand for economic business.
“In the course of extracting the sand, part of the river bank disintegrated and fell on the two,” said Msadala.
Msadala further added: “They were completely buried underneath the soil. Joana rushed home and informed the parents about the ordeal. The parents in the company of other villagers hurried to the scene and recovered the dead bodies.”
The incident was then reported at Mponela Police Station and the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) team accompanied by a Clinical officer from Mponela Rural Hospital visited the scene and viewed the bodies.
Postmortem conducted revealed that death was due to suffocation.
