Sloan and Maddox Mattingly, who is from Indiana, was doing what kids do at the beach: playing in the sand. They started to play and dig.
But the sand at Lauderdale-by-the-Sea beach came to life and swallowed the two siblings. Sloan, 7, died, and her brother Maddox, 9, is still in the hospital battling for his life.
The kids’ parents and family are now struggling with the “freak accident” that murdered the “purest human being.”
Therese and Jason Mattingly drove their two sons, Maddox, 9, and Sloan, 7, from Fort Wayne, Indiana, where it was freezing in the middle of February, to Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, Florida, where it was warm.
The family was at the beach making memories before 3 p.m. on February 20. The kids were playing in a large hole in the sand next to their parents.
But the journey with the family left them with a bad recollection.
Someone at the beach said, “Everyone’s screaming!” after seeing folks quickly slide into a hole and contact 911.
People said the person who called told dispatch, “They’re trying to get a kid out.” The caller then said that she heard the kids’ dad “yelling for help because his child is stuck in a hole in the sand.” The caller reported that the mother started yelling, “My daughter’s in there,” while they were on the phone.
They were caught in the sand pit, which was burying both Sloan and Maddox alive.
Attempted to save
NBC claimed that a number of emergency personnel came to the scene and used support boards to halt the sand from falling any more. After that, they used shovels to get Sloan and her brother out of the hole. No one knows how long they were stuck before someone came to get them.
Later, Sloan died at the hospital, where both kids had been taken.
Maddox was quite sick, and we don’t know how he’s doing now that he’s getting better.
“While we were on vacation yesterday, a freak accident took away our best 7.5 years.” Please don’t say you’re sorry for our loss. Don’t do that, please. Her mom says on the GoFundMe page that was set up to help the family with money, “We met the most pure person, and she changed us forever.” “We love you more than you can know.” Sloan, our beautiful friend. “What we would give.”
The GoFundMe site has raised around $146,000 of its $150,000 goal. It says, “What started as an amazing family trip quickly turned into the devastatingly tragic loss of their 7-year-old daughter/sister Sloan.” We know that no amount of money will bring beautiful Sloan back, but your donation can help bring Sloan home from Florida, pay for the burial, and ease the family’s financial worries as they adjust to their new life.
People are sending messages of love to the “sweet girl” who “was SO much bigger than her last moments” as all of this is going on.
Whitney Kanjala, a family friend, shares a picture of the family in front of Sloan’s Luxury Ice Cream shop in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea. There is a photo of the family next to her name. “She was the funniest friend you could ever ask for, the most loyal sister, the [tiniest] yet most acrobatic… and one of the best things Therese Mattingly and Jason Mattingly ever made,” she writes on Facebook.
On February 22, Sloan’s dad posted the identical image with the caption, “We took Sloan to this ice cream shop with her name on it.” We made the best of a rainy, bad day. We also sung karaoke at our Airbnb and went to an arcade nearby.
People who lived nearby were “devastated” and “shocked.”
One neighbor told CBS, “I’ve lived here for 50 years and have never seen anything like that.” There are no lifeguards at the beach right now. “I’m shocked.” I’m really shocked. I had no idea that digging a hole may make it fall down and hurt someone who is just hanging out and playing on the beach.
Someone else from the region gave their thoughts about the hole.
Harry Defina, who lives nearby, told NBC Miami that the youngsters were playing in a hole that a guy had dug only 30 minutes before the disaster.
“I was walking along the beach when I saw a man digging a hole that was as deep as his chest.” “I saw him, and he saw me.” I turned around and left. “I didn’t think to go over and tell him not to do it,” Defina said. “Even I’m mad that someone would say those kids dug that hole.” They didn’t dig that hole. It seemed big, but it was just 18 feet by 6 feet.
As he recounts about what he saw when the kids were buried, Defina fights back tears. “I see kids in the hole,” he says. I could see the boy a little bit, but all I can see is “I can’t finish this.” I could only see the girl’s head from the top.
The authorities are looking into what happened right now, and the American Lifeguard Association has also told people to be careful around sand holes.
Bernard J. Fisher II, the association’s director of health and safety, said, “The recent incident in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea is a heart-wrenching reminder of why we must work together to keep our beaches safe.” “We can stop more tragedies and make sure our beaches stay fun and safe for everyone by doing these things and making a community of safety and awareness.”
The group wants to see more beach patrols in areas where people are known to dig in the sand.
May you rest in peace, little one. It’s so awful that something so bad happened to kids who were just having fun.
