American Novelist John Dos Passos once said that "accidents will happen in the best regulated families." For one unfortunate family in Argentina, lighting struck twice in a tragic double-dose.
Hector Hugo Montenegro, 55, went out to a pier in Mar del Plata, Argentina to scatter his wife's ashes with his 11-year-old son. Moments later, it was the two mourners who were scattered out in the ocean's tumult.
The wave which carried them off took a hold of the father-son pair as they walked the rocks of a jetty on the city's south side pier.
Members of the Coast Guard told The Associated Press that they were able to pull the boy from the water alive, but the father was recovered dead. According to fisherman who were at the scene, the father and son moved past the concrete promenade set up for pedestrians and onto the rock jetty, which exposed them to the waves.
Montenegro's body, which was recovered shortly after the accident was covered in abrasions and one cut, leading some to speculate that any attempt the middle-aged man may have made to swim would have been obstructed by a concussion from blows to the head.
Mar de Plata is a city 250 miles from Buenos Aires and it's proximity to the capital makes it a major seaside resort destination for the country. But as Argentina is a southern hemisphere destination, the current autumn is part of the low season for tourism. At the time of press, it was unclear if Montenegro was a local resident, or if the wife had a connection to the port. The city has seen a huge resurgence of mass tourism in recent years, following an extreme downturn in the 1990s in which poverty and mass emigration made the city appear a bust.
Mar del Plata's DA is currently investigating the case, however the death has been ruled an accident and criminal charges are unlikely. The results of the autopsy are still pending.
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