One of two young men swimming off the Unakuruwa coast near Tangalle has drowned, and the second was still missing at the time of reporting, Hiru News reported on Thursday.
Police said the body of one of the two had been recovered.
The deceased was a 22-year-old resident of the Unakuruwa area. The man still missing is a 19-year-old from the Kirinda area, police said.
Unakuruwa is a coastal village in the Tangalle Divisional Secretariat division of Hambantota District, on the southern coast.
Context
Sea drownings along the southern coast have been a recurring concern, and the stretch is subject to periodic Met Department high-wave and strong-wind advisories. In May, a teacher drowned at Kirinda beach during a 24-hour advisory for hazardous coastal conditions.
Not reported
Neither man is named in the filing. It does not give the time of the incident, say whether a formal search operation involving the Navy or Coast Guard was mounted for the missing man, or state whether any sea or weather advisory was in force for the area. Hiru’s filing does not give the district for either Unakuruwa or Kirinda; the district stated above for Unakuruwa is established from this desk’s prior reporting on the Tangalle coast, and no district is asserted here for Kirinda.
This is a developing situation. The second man’s status may have changed since the source filing was published at 4.45 p.m. Colombo time on 29 October.