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  • 4 months ago
The massive search effort came to an end on Saturday morning by the Hunter Search and Rescue team and member of the Coast Guard after the body of Tara Lochansingh was found
Transcript
00:00The almost day-long search for devoted mother and grandmother Tara Lochan Singh
00:06ends in heartbreak. This as the 47-year-old's body was fished out of the devilish depths of
00:13Matura River, exactly where she was last seen hoisting her six-year-old granddaughter to safety
00:20on a bamboo embankment before being drawn in to the murky water.
00:25What was meant to be a peaceful family outing on the first day of the emancipation long weekend
00:31turned into a nightmare. Lochan Singh's daughter-in-law tells the Express even as the group enjoyed the
00:37water, her daughter's slipper was swept away and Lochan Singh reached out to get it. She, the child
00:45and Lochan Singh's husband were pulled in the moving water. In a final act of heroism and even as she
00:52stared death in its face. Lochan Singh pushed her beloved granddaughter onto the bamboo patch before
00:59being sucked downwards. She briefly told her husband, who was right behind her, she was being pulled down.
01:06He too found himself fighting against the deathly pull. But their fate was not meant to be the same.
01:14He too struggled against the water's deadly force but managed to fight his way to safety.
01:19Tara, on the other hand, was not seen alive again.
01:24By this time, first responders were alerted and a search and rescue immediately launched.
01:29The police, family, hunters search and rescue, bystanders and nearby residents all pitched in
01:36to locate the missing woman. As the day drew quickly into night, hope too faded.
01:43The search was called off at 3am on Saturday and resumed by daybreak. Shamsuddin Ayoub and his team
01:51said they suspected the body to be lodged in the dense bamboo bordering the river's plunge along the bank.
01:58We were moving out of the rubber, the bamboo, which we believe she went underneath.
02:03Because since yesterday, we were removing that bamboo.
02:06And by removing the bamboo, a short while this morning, around 11 o'clock in the year round,
02:13the coast guard found and they told us that we came out of the water.
02:19They were diving. And by diving, they saw the body below the bamboo patch.
02:24An autopsy will take place next week as the woman's community joins in mourning her loss.
02:31She is said to be an avocado saleswoman and was remembered by family and neighbours
02:36as a devoted grandmother, known for her kindness and generosity.
02:42Shortly before she went missing and even as the search was ongoing,
02:46her son, Brandon Lochencing, posted a plea to Facebook saying,
02:50Mommy, I will find you. Please come back to me.
02:53Though paying with her life, relatives credit the grandmother for her quick thinking,
02:58courage and the love she embodied until the very end.
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