Two people are dead after a tragic accident in Farmingville, Long Island. Eduardo Vanegas-Fuentes, 16, and Edgar Calderon-Castro, 19, opened the cover to a backyard cesspool around 8 p.m. Vanegas-Fuentes apparently lost his footing, fell in, and lost consciousness. Then Calderon-Castro, in an attempt to save his friend, jumped in, but he too lost consciousness.
Samuel Suarez, whose family rents the house and property where the tragedy took place, told Newsday they were planning on starting a campfire and had no idea the cover was for a cesspool, which was 16 feet deep and about half full. Suarez had gone to call 911 when Calderon-Castro jumped in.
When the fire department arrived, Newsday reports they "used a 12-foot pike pole to grab the clothing of one of the victims and pull him out. Rescuers used a roof ladder with hooks to pull the other victim from the cesspool." The pair were taken to Stony Brook University Hospital, but they died this morning.
Last year, a teen working at a Smithtown Dunkin' Donuts was killed when he fell through a cesspool manhole cover that broke under him. And in 2009, a worker survived after being rescued from a LI cesspool that collapsed.
