Teenage boy first casualty of Perlis floods

A teenage boy drowned in a retention pond in Kampung Padang Malau, Beseri, here this evening, the first casualty of the floods in Perlis. Muhammad Izwan Ahmad, 15, had slipped and fallen into the swollen pond at about 3.30pm when playing with his younger brother and a friend in floodwaters near a paddy field behind the Tabligh Beseri Mosque, said a spokesman of the Perlis Department of Civil Defence (JPAM). JPAM divers found the body of Muhammad Izwan, a student of Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Beseri, at about 5pm and sent it to the Tuanku Fauziah Hospital in Kangar, he said. "The boys did not realise that there is a retention pond almost five metres deep because of the floodwaters," the spokesman said. Padang Besar Police chief Supt Rizani Che Ismail, when contacted, confirmed the incident.