Indianapolis Metropolitan Police officers raced to the 7600 block of Island Club Drive shortly after 4 p.m. Saturday after a report that a child was missing and possibly in the water. The call led them to a pond at Loch Haven Apartment Homes, a complex tucked between U.S. 136 and I-74 on the city's northwest side.
According to WISH-TV, officers pulled the child from the water and medical staff were able to revive the child after arriving at the hospital. WTHR reported on the same Saturday rescue at the same address and said the child had been revived and was alive. IMPD confirmed the case is being investigated as a drowning, the station reported.
If the child did not survive, the Marion County Coroner's Office will determine the cause and manner of death, per IMPD. No criminal activity is suspected in connection with the incident, and additional details were not immediately available as the story continued to develop Saturday evening.
A Second Pond Emergency In Two Days
The Island Club Drive call came less than 24 hours after a child died after drowning in a retention pond at Boardwalk at Westlake Apartments and Townhomes on Indianapolis' west side, according to WIBC. WISH-TV's report on the Friday fatal drowning placed it at a Speedway apartment complex and said the child was unresponsive when officers arrived and later died at a hospital.
Taken together, the back-to-back calls mark the latest entries in what has become a grim annual pattern. Children have drowned in retention ponds around Indianapolis each summer for at least the past three years, according to the IndyStar. WRTV reported in July that two Indianapolis children had drowned in retention ponds in just the span of a month, including 19-month-old Adrian Douglas Breed Jr., who was found in a pond on the city's northeast side and later died in the hospital.
Other Recent Cases Around Indianapolis
Three-year-old Ka'Mauri Williams was reported missing from TGM Avalon Lake last year and was soon found in the complex's large retention pond, per IndyStar. Emergency personnel treated him before he reached St. Vincent Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Five-year-old Roby Chacreton drowned in a retention pond at Astoria Park Apartments in August 2024, and 2-year-old Anna Mandanda died in a pond in the Governors Pointe neighborhood that May, according to the same IndyStar report.
Pond Safety Efforts
Pond safety has been the subject of efforts to address it, IndyStar reported. Indianapolis has a stormwater design manual.
Those efforts have gotten nowhere, IndyStar reported.
