The devastated family of a 7-year-old girl who was buried alive in a sand hole have spoken of their heartbreak following her tragic death.
Sloan Mattingly passed away after being buried alive while playing with her brother on a Florida beach.
Her grieving mother said that they are ‘forever changed’ after the incident that occurred at Lauderdale-by-the Sea beach.
Writing on a GoFundMe page, which has raised more than $140,000, Therese Mattingly wrote: “A freak accident happened yesterday while we are here on vacation and it took away our greatest 7.5 years.”
“Don’t tell us you’re sorry for our loss… don’t do that to us. We experienced the purest human being and we are forever changed by her.
“We love you beyond any stretch of the imagination. Our sweet Sloan. What we would give.”
During Sloan’s final moments, she grabbed onto her brother, Maddox, in an attempt to save herself.
Maddox was taken to a hospital in a stable condition. It took rescuers 20 minutes to get his sister out of the sand that collapsed around her.
Sloan’s heartbroken uncle, Chris Sloan, told KFOR: “We found out that after the sand had caved. She kept trying to grab up Maddox’s leg to get up out of the sand and eventually he couldn’t feel her moving anymore.”
He described his niece as a girl with ‘a lot of energy and just totally innocent.’
“She was always happy,” he expressed. “She was really fun to be around. She had a lot of energy and just totally innocent, and that’s what hurts the most in all this.”
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