A 17-year-old Massachusetts boy has died after being pulled from the water at Bigelow Hollow State Park in Union, according to the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection.
DEEP officials said Eliseo Santos, of Southbridge, was pulled from Mashapaug Lake around 4 p.m. Sunday and first responders administered CPR until Santos was transported to Harrington Hospital in Southbridge, Mass., but he died at the hospital on Sunday night.
Santos would have turned 18 on Aug. 10.
State Environmental Conservation police and the Tolland County Dive Team, among others, responded to Bigelow Hollow.
“There were friends swimming with him and he went down. I guess they tried to get him and then they obviously had to swim to shore, get their cellphones, and call,” Chief David Eaton, of the Union Fire Department, said.
According to DEEP, the ponds at Bigelow Hollow are not designated state swimming areas and are never staffed by lifeguards.
“We saw a boat, one of the rescue boats, it had a couple people in it and there was a girl sitting in the front of the boat. She was kind of pointing in the direction. And she said 'I last saw him over here. I last saw him over here,'” Lorraine Latkofsky, of Enfield, said.
