Friends and family in Vineland are mourning the loss of two brothers who drowned. Police suspect one brother started to struggle in the water and the other brother drowned while trying to save him. NBC10’s Ted Greenberg reports.
Two brothers who were fishing drowned in a South Jersey lake Wednesday night after one had trouble swimming and the other tried to save him, officials said.
“They were close. They were really close,” Danny Cabrera, a friend of the victims, told NBC10.
The bodies of the two brothers, identified as 30-year-old Otoniel Bautista-Vargas and 27-year-old Saul Bautista-Vargas, were pulled from Crystal Lake near Delsea Drive and Elmer Road in Vineland Wednesday night after another fisherman spotted something about 10 feet down, officials with the Downe Township Fire/Rescue dive team said.
Swimming isn't allowed in the lake, one of many former quarries scattered across South Jersey.
"You may be in a foot of water and one or two steps you can be in 30, 40 feet of water," Chief Cliff Higbee, Sr., of the Downe Township Fire/Rescue Dive Team, said. "They're very dangerous. They're not a safe place to swim.”
No foul play was suspected.
Correction: This story initially incorrectly named the Downe Township Fire/Rescue dive team.
