The tragedy in the cutwater: a hunter died after separating from his group in Rocha

By Roy Rodriquez

The silence of the rural area near the Black Lagoon, in the department of Rocha, this weekend became the scene of a fatal outcome. What began as a routine hunting party among friends ended abruptly when one of the group members, a 60-year-old man from Montevideo, never returned to the agreed meeting point.

The dynamic was simple: after touring the countryside, the group decided to return to the homes in the area to rest. However, the man, who had family roots in the east of the country, chose to stay a few more moments on the property. It was that decision that marked the beginning of an agonizing wait for his companions, who, seeing that the minutes turned into hours and the hunter did not appear, decided to retrace their path.

The discovery in the darkness of the field

The search, although brief, was fraught with tension. Upon reaching the area where they had left him again, the scene was empty. There were no traces of his presence, only the mountains and the characteristic silence of the Roche night. Fear took over the group when, upon checking the perimeter, they located the man's body submerged in the waters of a nearby cutwater.

The body was rescued from an area whose depth was around three meters. The first hypotheses that investigators use are clear: it was an accident. The man would have slipped along the edge of the reflecting pool, falling inside without the possibility of getting out, in a terrain that, due to the humidity and vegetation, is usually deceptive for any walker, even the most experienced in hunting.

An accident that mourns the east

The news hit the local community. Although the man lived in Montevideo, his ties with Rocha were strong, and his presence in the area was frequent during hunting seasons. The tajamar, an everyday element in the agricultural landscape of eastern Uruguay, was transformed into a death trap in a matter of seconds.

Rocha police personnel went to the scene as soon as they received the notification, carrying out the corresponding tests to confirm that there were no other causes behind the death. The Prosecutor's Office is now working on closing the investigation, although all the testimonies of the companions point to the same mechanics: a stumble, an accidental fall and the impossibility of reacting to a depth that turned out to be lethal.

Caution in rural areas

These types of events, although isolated, remind us of the inherent dangers of activities in the open field, where the geography can change with rain or the wear and tear of the terrain. The cutwaters, essential for irrigation and livestock, represent a silent risk for those who travel through rural areas without fully knowing the stability of their edges.

While the family carries out the procedures to transfer the remains to Montevideo, the case remains a bitter warning about the risks of separating from the group on field trips. In Rocha, the tranquility of the Esteño landscape was interrupted by a tragedy that could have been avoided, but that ended a life in a moment of distraction.