Melbourne student dies while on school camp in South Australia
A Melbourne student has died while on a school camp in South Australia.
The 17-year-old student is from the prestigious Huntingtower School in the eastern Melbourne suburb of Mount Waverley.
His death came on the second day of a four-day trek at rugged Plumbago Station, 200km west of Broken Hill in the remote South Australian outback.
The student had been in good health prior to the camp and had just begun a gruelling trek through a very dry landscape - with temperatures in the low 40s.
Sholto Bowen, the school's principal, received a call at 5:30pm on Monday indicating a teenage boy was ill at a camp in Plumbago, near Broken Hill, being attended by 75 year 11 students as part of an "outdoor education experience".
They were trying to get him transported to hospital via the Royal Flying Doctors Service but he never made it.
Mr Bowen did not make a comment on the student's cause of death, saying that other students were already on the way home and parents were today being notified of the "devastating incident".
"It is with a heavy heart that I inform you of the sad passing of a year 11 student on the camp to Plumbago Station", Mr Bowen said in a statement on Tuesday.
"Our thoughts, sympathies and prayers are with the student’s family and friends, and with the students and teachers who were on the camp."
"The camp has been cancelled and the students are returning to Huntingtower.
"Counselling is being provided for the students and staff, and the wider school community."
The principal said it was "a very, very sad day for us," with the "loss of this wonderful young man".
South Australian police are currently preparing a report for the coroner.
News break – February 23
