Tragic Death of 11-Year-Old Girl at Waterpark Ruled as Unlawful Killing
A coroner has concluded that an 11-year-old girl, Kyra Hill, was unlawfully killed after drowning at a waterpark in Berkshire in 2022. The inquest at Berkshire Coroner’s Court heard that Kyra died after getting into difficulty in a designated swimming area at Liquid Leisure near Windsor while attending a birthday party on 6 August 2022.
According to Sky News, Senior Coroner Heidi Connor ruled that there were gross breaches of health and safety measures at the park which contributed to Kyra’s death. The breaches related to the depth and visibility of the water and the absence of an emergency plan and risk assessment, she found. The court heard that there were no signs warning of deep water at the leisure park, despite various sharp drops of up to 4.5m (14.7ft) within the swimming zone.
The lake where Kyra was seen going under was 2.68m (8.8ft) deep, a report carried out after the incident found. A 17-year-old lifeguard managed to reach the point where Kyra disappeared, but staff at the centre are only qualified to perform "surface-water rescues" – not underwater ones. The inquest heard evidence of how there was a 10-minute gap between the first and second searches for the youngster in that part of the lake.
Kyra’s family has spoken out about the incident, with her father, Leonard Hill, telling Sky News that she was "left to drown" and accusing the operator of "neglect". He described Kyra’s life as a "shining example of resilience and strength" and said that her memory demands that safer standards are implemented now. "No parent should endure this pain and no child’s life should be sacrificed so recklessly," he said.
The inquest also heard that the frantic search for Kyra was likened to a "nightmare" by a mother attending the birthday party, while a police officer described it as a "chaotic scene" due to "conflicting" information being fed to the emergency crews. The diver who eventually found Kyra told the inquest that the lake had "almost zero visibility".
Coroner Heidi Connor noted that parents and carers were not advised to attend with children in a ratio of one to four, and young children were permitted to swim without buoyancy aids. There was also no emergency plan or risk assessment that took those factors into account, and no control measures were identified and put in place to "take account of these clear risks", she said. A post-mortem examination confirmed Kyra’s cause of death as "drowning".
In her conclusions, Coroner Connor said: "Members of the family, at no point have I forgotten that this was about your 11-year-old, Kyra, and I am so very sorry that you are here today. It must have been incredibly difficult to sit in court and hear some of the evidence that we’ve heard. I offer all of you my heartfelt condolences."
The incident has raised concerns about safety standards at leisure parks, with Leonard Hill calling for urgent reform. "Summer should be a time of joy in creating happy memories with family and friends," he said. "It should never end in tragedy. It should never mark the day we mourn our children’s lives, lost in places where they should have been safe."
This article is based on reporting by Sky News and can be found here: https://news.sky.com/story/girl-11-unlawfully-killed-after-she-drowned-at-waterpark-inquest-rules-13371361.
