Three members of a family have died and a young girl remains in a critical condition in hospital after the Shoreham Fort family drowning off the Sussex coast on Tuesday afternoon. People has identified the three who died as Hassan El-Khawas, 55, his partner Zeina Alayn, 37, and their 14-year-old daughter Sara El-Khawas, all confirmed dead at the scene.
Emergency services were called at around 2.40pm to reports of four people in difficulty in the water close to Shoreham Fort in Shoreham-by-Sea, West Sussex. Multiple ambulances and two air ambulances were deployed to the beach near the RNLI station. Al Jazeera reports that the Palestinian embassy in London confirmed the family were Palestinian British.
What happened at the Shoreham Fort family drowning
Chief Superintendent James Collis addressed reporters and set out the sequence of events. Sussex Police believe the family entered the water from land for a swim. All four were brought to shore by emergency services, but three did not survive.
Chief Superintendent Collis said: ‘Around 2.40pm this afternoon, emergency services were called to reports of four people in difficulty in the water close to Shoreham Fort. Sussex Police supported His Majesty’s Coast Guard and the RNLI as all four people were brought to shore. Tragically, despite the best efforts of paramedics, three people – a man, a woman, and a teenage girl – were sadly confirmed deceased. A younger girl has been taken to hospital and is in critical condition. We can confirm all four people were from the same family, and their next of kin have been informed.’
Specialist officers are supporting the family’s next of kin. Sussex Police has asked anyone with information or video footage to make contact online or by calling 101, quoting Operation North.
The emergency response at Shoreham-by-Sea
The scale of the response reflected the severity of the incident. A HM Coastguard helicopter was scrambled, alongside rescue teams from Littlehampton, Shoreham and Newhaven. An RNLI lifeboat from Shoreham was also deployed. The A259 Brighton Road was blocked in both directions from New Road to Kingston Lane in the aftermath.
Shoreham-by-Sea sits around 80 miles south of London, on the West Sussex coast. The area around Shoreham Fort is open shoreline, and Tuesday’s incident follows a summer that has seen repeated warnings from coastguard and water safety bodies about the risks of open-water swimming at unsupervised stretches of coast.
East Worthing and Shoreham MP Tom Rutland issued a statement. ‘I am deeply saddened by the tragic news that three people have died following an incident in the water near Shoreham Fort this afternoon,’ he wrote. ‘I spoke earlier with Sussex Police and Shoreham RNLI and have been briefed on the response by the emergency services. My thoughts are with the family and friends of those who have lost their lives, and I know the whole community here in Shoreham will be hoping and praying for the recovery of the young girl receiving medical treatment in hospital.’
The Shoreham Fort family drowning has prompted an outpouring of response both locally and internationally, given the family’s Palestinian British background. The Palestinian embassy in London’s confirmation of the family’s identity, reported by Al Jazeera, has brought international attention to what began as a local coastguard callout on a summer afternoon.
The younger girl’s condition remains critical. Sussex Police continues to appeal for witnesses and anyone who filmed the incident to come forward via Operation North.