The search operation to retrieve the bodies of three students from Khonoma village, including two minor girls, who drowned in a deep frozen lake at the Sanctuary Fall in western Dzukou valley under Kohima district turned futile for the third day today, Khonoma village sources said.
Sources said the three along with their friends had gone for a picnic on December 26 at the Sanctuary Fall in western Dzukou valley under Kohima district.
The icy layer of the lake broke when too many of them stood on the it to take photographs and six of them fell in the lake, they said.
Two of them managed to come out while one of them was pulled out by friends, but three others sunk in the lake drowned after much struggle, the sources said adding the submerged bodies remained untraced in the 80 feet long, 60 feet wide lake with a depth of 35 feet.
The search operation today was conducted by a Disaster Management team from Guwahati, but they were unable to trace the bodies.
The three deceased were school students and have been identified as Rokosietso Mor, class XII, his younger sister Ketourovino Mor, class IX and Mhiesikhono Viyie, also a class IX student.
