Flowers and tributes were laid on Burnham-On-Sea’s sea wall at the weekend to mark the sad anniversary of the drowning of Dylan Cecil, a four year-old boy who died after being swept from the town’s jetty.
Flowers, cards and balloons were laid by the family next to a plaque which was installed in his memory on Burnham’s South Esplanade after the tragedy in 2012.
Burnham’s marine rescue crews were called out on August 19th, 2012 at 6pm following reports of a young boy in the water next to Burnham’s jetty.
The Cecil family were in the area visiting family and had decided to go for a trip to the beach when tragedy struck. Tragically, while he was playing in the shallow water on the jetty, four-year-old Dylan slipped and fell into the sea.
His mother and father attempted to rescue him by jumping into the water and also nearly became victims of the strong incoming tidal currents. Within seconds, Dylan had been carried out to sea.
Burnham’s Coastguards, RNLI and BARB crewmembers undertook a full-scale search until Dylan’s body was sadly found washed up by a walker near the yacht club on August 23rd, 2012.
Dylan’s grandparents, Jackie and Dave McCollum, gathered besides the memorial plaque on the sea wall in his memory at 6pm on Saturday August 19th – the exact time that the boy was lost to the sea 11 years ago.
