Two 10-year-old girls were hailed as heroes Monday, a day after they rescued a toddler who fell through the ice at a small pond in Aurora.
At 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Delma Solis and her cousin Azalea Ocon-Solis saw the 3-year-old struggling to pull himself out of the icy pond near The Promenade at Towne Center at Sable Boulevard and East Alameda Avenue. Delma ran to grab the boy while Azalea called 911, according to Aurora police Detective Robert Friel.
“He was scared because he couldn’t breathe a lot, so he wasn’t screaming,” Delma said Monday.
9News identified the toddler as Isaiah Casillas.
Isaiah wandered onto the ice to retrieve a ball he had been playing with when the ice gave way. The water was about 2 feet deep, Friel said.
Delma kept Isaiah from going underneath the water, until an adult helped pull him from the pond.
“I was kind of scared because the ice could have broken any minute,” Delma said.
They stripped off the boy’s wet clothes and wrapped him in blankets.
The boy was taken to Children’s Hospital and later released, Friel said.
“We would refer to them as heroes for what they did,” Friel said.
The Aurora police’s Crimes Against Children Unit is investigating the incident. So far no criminal charges have been filed, Friel said.
“We are looking at whether or not there is an issue regarding the supervision,” Friel said.
Isaiah’s parents are cooperating with the police.
Children will always play around dangerous things, Friel said. Incidents such as this demonstrate how crucial proper supervision is.
“You just do not know where this could have gone,” Friel said.
Kurt Hartnett, 45, moved into the apartment complex in May. He said unsupervised children are not rare, and any given day there are at least five unsupervised children playing in the courtyard where the pond is.
Hartnett said he has seen children playing on the ice before.
“I’m not surprised something like this happened, but you always hope that it does not,” Hartnett said.
Jordan Steffen:303-954-1638 or jsteffen@denverpost.com
