Watch: Waterfall trip turns tragic as 5 picnickers drown in Pune’s Bhushi dam near Lonavala

PUNE: A monsoon outing to Lonavla turned tragic for 15 people from two families from Sayyadnagar in Hadapsar in Pune on Sunday afternoon.

A 36-year-old woman and two girls aged 13 and 8 drowned, while a four-year-old boy and a seven-year-old girl were missing after they were swept down a waterfall by a surge in the volume of water in the backwaters of Bhushi dam.

The group of 15 trekked about 2km up the hilly area near the dam and were playing in the waters of a stream. At least 10 of them were swept away when the volume of water increased. Locals and some other revellers managed to rescue five of the group.

Pune Rural superintendent of police Pankaj Deshmukh told TOI, “Two people who were rescued sustained injuries. They have been admitted to a nearby hospital.”

Rescue teams from Shiv Durga Mitra, Lonavla and Wanyajeev Rakshak, Maval carried out searches for the two missing children till late in the evening. “We stopped due to darkness. We will continue on Monday morning,” Nilesh Garade of Wanyajeev Rakshak, Maval, said.

Revellers ignore safety advice near Bhushi dam

Warning boards advising against entering the water in Bhushi dam, a popular monsoon destination in Lonavla, and trekking up the hills where numerous waterfalls can lead to accidents are often ignored by visitors who come to enjoy the rain.

A group of 15 people from two families in Hadapsar did not heed such warnings on Sunday. A woman and two girls drowned and a search is on for two children. Ten of them were swept away when the volume of water rose in the waterfall and swept them away. Five were rescued.

“The group went to the area where entry is restricted. There are warning boards but they ignored them,” deputy superintendent of police (Lonavla division) Sathya Sai Karthik said.

On Sunday, the dam started overflowing following good rain in Maval taluka. The Pune Rural police have already issued an advisory to tourists going to Bhushi dam telling them not to venture into the dam’s waters.
The police have also advised tourists to not go up into the hills. Unmindful revellers enter the dam’s waters or go up the hills, ignoring the warning boards.

Deshmukh said the group came to Lonavla for a picnic in a mini-bus. They reached the waterfall site flowing into Bhushi dam. “There was heavy rain in the hills and there was a flash floodlike situation. Ten members of the group were swept away. Five of them were rescued by the people. The rescue teams recovered the bod ies of a woman and the 13-year-old girl later in the afternoon. The eight-year-old girl’s body was recovered in the evening,” Deshmukh said.

He added that they have deployed men near Bhushi dam but the group went into the forest area and ventured into the stream.

An officer from the Pune Rural police said that they were in the middle of the stream and the volume and force of the water was quite high. “All of them were holding on to a man who was with them before they were swept away. Only five could be rescued,” the officer said.