An American firefighter drowned while trying to save his daughter at sea off the New Jersey shore near Avon-by-the-Sea.
The New York Times reported that firefighter Mark Batista, a father of three and a veteran member of the New York Fire Department, “brought his family to the beach on Friday morning (…) and shortly after, his daughter went swimming in the waves.”
And suddenly and without warning, “a deadly and swift sea current appeared, and began to pull the girl away from the shore.”
The newspaper quoted some of his friends and local authorities as saying, “Batista rushed to save her. But the current in the sea, with all its cruelty, pulled him down.”
Batista, 39, a veteran firefighter and emergency medical technician, drowned, according to Jim Long, a fire department spokesman.
Mark Batista, a veteran member of the New York Fire Department, drowned on Friday while trying to rescue his daughter from a deadly rip current along the New Jersey shore, a spokesman for the agency said. His daughter survived. https://t.co/xgUVczot2z
— The New York Times (@nytimes) June 12, 2023
He was taken to the district hospital, where he was pronounced dead, and his daughter, whose name or age was not disclosed, survived.
Months before the incident, she shared a photo of Batista and his daughter on Instagram and included a comment expressing her love for the child. The post was part of her explanation of their relationship.
According to initial data from the National Weather Service, the sinking of the Batista marks the second recorded incident along the 130-mile (209 km) coast of New Jersey this year. The first occurred on Memorial Day weekend when a 15-year-old boy drowned at Sandy Hook Beach after being caught in a current. This information was reported by the newspaper.
According to the data and the Monmouth County Sheriff’s Office, there were no lifeguards on duty when the drownings occurred.
