KUALA TERENGGANU: A teenager with a history of sleep walking, walked to her death from the balcony of her home in Kampung Banggol Nyior in Tepoh, 30km from here, Saturday.
In the 9am incident, Norshariah Ismail, 14, walked straight from her room to the balcony before she fell into a waterlogged compound of her house, which had been submerged in floodwater since Thursday.
Her other family members were unaware of the incident until one of her uncles saw her body bobbing in the water.
Norshariah’s grandmother Esah Abdullah, 60, when met at the Sultanah Nur Zahirah Hospitals mortuary said that, apart from suffering from sleep walking, her granddaughter had been also afflicted with epilepsy since she was five.
She speculated that Norshariah could have been sleep walking when she fell into the one-meter high flood water and drowned.
“What is most tragic is that she died just outside our home,” she said in a choked voice.
Esah said her family was still unable to accept Nurshariah’s death, especially since the flood water was showing sign of receding due the sunny weather since Friday.
She said the girl’s father Ismail Ibrahim, 49 was still in shock as he was inside the house when his daughter drowned.
“Prior to this tragedy we sought many treatments for Norshariah to enable her to lead a normal life but, unfortunately, it had to end in this manner,” she added.
So far, the floods in Terengganu, which first hit the state on Nov 5, have claimed seven lives.-The Staronline
