A one-year-old toddler drowned in a swimming pool while her parents watched a World Cup football match pitting their national team Argentina against Mexico.
Allegra Renna Benigno, who was just 1 year and eight months old, reportedly walked by herself to the pool while her parents were watching the Argentine national team thrash Mexico 2-0 in the Qatar World Cup with their friends.
The tragic incident took place in the Rawson Department of Argentina’s southern province of Chubut, on Saturday, 26th November, but it has only been revealed now.
The swimming pool is reportedly 5 metres (16 feet) long by 2 metres (6.5 feet) wide and 1.5 metres (4.9 feet) deep.
Prosecutor Adrian Riveros said that Allegra, the younger of two sisters, “walked by herself to the pool and fell into the water” without anyone noticing.
Security footage from the house shows that the young girl’s mother only noticed that her daughter had fallen into the water about 15 minutes after she died, according to local media.
By this point, it was already after 6pm and the match was over.
But their joy at seeing Argentina beat Mexico was quickly replaced with screams of despair as her parents frantically tried to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation calling the emergencies.
The ambulance was then delayed and so her parents, Dario and Priscilla Renna, a lawyer and a sports teacher, took their young daughter to the Rene Favaloro hospital in the city of Villa Krause.
Allegra reportedly arrived at the hospital at around 7:30pm but she no longer had any vital signs and efforts by medics to revive her were fruitless.
She was declared dead, with her father Dario reportedly saying that the tragic death took place as a result of a terrible oversight.
The authorities have opened a case to investigate the “causes of death”, with Riveros saying that the investigation is ongoing.
If it is determined that the young girl’s death was accidental, her parents would be exempt of any charges, according to local media.
Riveros said: “We have to confirm whether or not there was any action that caused the death of the little girl, but in principle we understand that this was not the case.”
A preliminary autopsy has determined that little Allegra drowned.
The investigation is ongoing.
