“We love you beyond any stretch of the imagination. Our sweet Sloan. What we would give,” Therese Mattingly wrote to Facebook.
The mother of a young girl who died after a large sand hole she and her brother dug collapsed shared a heartbreaking message about her daughter.
Sloan Mattingly, 7, and her 9-year-old brother Maddox were buried under sand when a six-foot deep hole they were digging on a Florida beach collapsed. Witnesses said as the children’s parents and others made efforts to save them, ad while their father was able to grab Sloan’s hand, he could not pull her out in time.
Maddox survived and has been released from the hospital.
The children’s mother, Therese, posted a heartbreaking message on Facebook.
“We experienced the purest human being and we are forever changed by her. We love you beyond any stretch of the imagination. Our sweet Sloan. What we would give,” Therese wrote.
The family from Fort Wayne, Indiana, was on vacation in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, a small beach resort near Fort Lauderdale.
Videos of kids buried in sand, sometimes up to their necks, is a trend that has been growing on social media. But there are risks.
Dr. Stephen Leatherman, known as Dr. Beach, is an expert on beach safety.
“Holes on the beach are death traps,” Leatherman says.
There were no lifeguards on the beach in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, which may have been a factor in Sloan’s death. On other Florida beaches, lifeguards routinely warn tourists not to dig deep holes.
