SYDNEY, FEB 26: Authorities are scouring the sea for a missing Nepali student after he was swept off rocks near New South Wales’s famous Figure Eight Pools.
Emergency services were called to the area in the Royal national park, south of Sydney, on Monday afternoon after two men – both in their 20s – were washed in.
The youngest of the two was able to climb to safety on a rock shelf and was treated for minor lacerations at the scene.
But the 22-year-old student, a Nepali national, disappeared under the water and didn’t resurface. Three others were with the pair but weren’t injured.
On Tuesday a man’s body was pulled from the water at Little Marley beach, also in the national park, but police did not believe it was that of the student.
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Emergency services were called to the beach about 10.50am after reports a person was seen floating. He was winched out by a helicopter but could not be revived.
A small fishing vessel was also found on rocks at nearby Bundeena.
At the time the student went missing, the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service’s wave risk at the pools was listed as “extreme”. Under these conditions, the service urges people not to visit the pools.
Surf Life Saving NSW, police marine command and police divers were all working to recover the missing student.
University of NSW Prof Rob Brander, an expert in rip currents and coastal geomorphology, said locals long understood and respected the dangers of the pools at high tide.
But he warned on Facebook following the incident that social media was now driving a large number of uninformed tourists to the “overcrowded death trap”.
“The level of danger is increasing because the number of people visiting has increased dramatically,” Brander said. “And the vast majority of those people are not aware at all of the hazardous conditions or the best times to visit.”
News of the incident sparked messages of mourning from NSW’s Nepali community. One man called on his “Nepali fellow brothers” to be careful around the ocean.
“Never think yourself a hero,” he wrote on Facebook on Monday. “Everest is high very very high but Sea is low. Really different. Think thrice.”
Brander said the wave risk website was a wonderful resource but travellers were not using it.
“This is a problem for anything we do related to public safety – getting people to heed warnings,” he said. “People are now drawn to isolated and potentially dangerous places without understanding the risks and hazards involved.”
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