Two school students never came back home after going out on Saturday since they had drowned in an irrigation lake in the Central Highlands province of Lam Dong.

Son Thuy Huyen and her cousin Son Truong Anh Kiet, both 13, who were students from Nguyen Du Middle School, located in Di Linh Town in the namesake district, were found dead in the afternoon, local authorities confirmed.

Before the incident occurred, the duo had gone to catch snails at a paddy field behind their homes in the same district together with their friends – Son Thuy Ngoc, 8, and Son Hoang Anh, 7.

Around 1:00 pm, the youngsters went to a reservoir nearby from which water is used to water coffee fields.

While frolicking, Huyen and Kiet tripped and fell into the lake, where there was a warning sign at the time of the accident.

Ngoc rushed home to seek help but the two victims had died before everyone arrived.

This is the second drowning involving children playing near irrigation reservoirs in Lam Dong since late June 2017.

The earlier accident also claimed two lives.

Vietnam’s rate of child drowning is one of the highest in Asia.

A recent World Health Organization survey finds that 32 children in Vietnam die from drowning every day, and the number of child drownings per year is as high as 11,665.

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