The mother of a toddler who drowned after being swept from Kirkcaldy Esplanade by a freak wave has spoken for the first time about the tragedy.
Jadwiga Serafin admits that internet rumours suggesting she was at fault for three-year-old Eryk Cieraszewski’s death have almost driven her to take her own life.
The 28-year-old single mum from Poland has also spoken about the impact of the accident on her five-year-old daughter, who refuses to accept that little Eryk is gone.
Oliwia was at the Esplanade with her mum and brother on a sunny Saturday afternoon last November when a huge wave knocked Eryk off his feet and dragged him backwards through a gap in the sea wall.
Jadwiga tried desperately to grab hold of her boy but she wasn’t quick enough and he was swept 20 metres out into the Firth of Forth.
She said: ”Eryk and Oliwia were splashing in the puddles, about two metres from the break in the wall. I took my camera out to take a picture and a big wave came over and took him away.
”I couldn’t believe it. I went into shock. I started screaming but I was so panicked that I could only speak in Polish.
”People couldn’t understand me so I went through the gap and down the stairs myself. I waded in, up to my waist. I could hear Oliwia crying for me to stay with her.
”I looked and looked but I couldn’t see Eryk so I came back up. I was running along the promenade when I saw him in the water.
”I started pointing and I went to jump in but some people grabbed hold of my clothes and held me back. They were trying to talk me out of it. Oliwia was crying out ‘don’t leave me, mummy, don’t leave me.”
The emergency services were immediately scrambled to the scene and a lifeboat from Kinghorn pulled Eryk from the water a few minutes later.
The toddler had no pulse and he was immediately rushed ashore where resuscitation attempts began in a waiting ambulance.
He was taken under police escort to the Victoria Hospital a few hundred yards away, where efforts to revive him continued for over an hour.
But doctors were unable to save his life and Eryk was pronounced dead an hour and a half after the rescue, with his distraught mother by his side.’I keep wishing I’d jumped in’A police spokesman later described the death as ”a tragic accident”, but Jadwiga, who emigrated to Fife from Krakow in 2006, admits she often blames herself.
She said: ”I go over it in my head every moment of the day. I dream about it at night. I keep wishing I’d jumped in after him. I could have died but I wish I had gone in.
”People talk about me on the internet. They say it’s my fault, that I’m a bad mother, and that I’m stupid. Sometimes I think that I am a bad mother if I hadn’t taken him to the promenade that day nothing would have happened.
”But it was a nice day. The sun was out. And Eryk was begging me to take him to the beach. ‘Just 10 or 20 minutes,’ he was saying. I was tired after working late but I agreed because he loved being out in the sun.
”Every day I feel bad (about that decision). When I wake up in the morning I feel like I want to die. But I have to stay here for Oliwia. I have to stay strong for her.”
Eryk began attending the nursery at North Primary School in Kirkcaldy last November, shortly before he died. His sister Oliwia is due to start primary two at the same school after the summer.
Seven months on from the tragedy, the five-year-old refuses to accept that Eryk isn’t coming back.’She waits for him’Jadwiga said: ”When she goes to school in the morning she tells me that Eryk should be coming too. She thinks he’s still here. Sometimes she won’t leave. She waits for him.
”The school are very good. They gently explain to her that he’s gone. But she doesn’t believe it. When we go shopping she tells me to buy things for him, like clothes. It’s heartbreaking.
”I blame myself because I didn’t want her to see the coffin or come to the funeral. But I thought I was protecting her.”
Jadwiga is also struggling to move on, preferring to keep the tot’s bedroom exactly as it was on the day he died.
”Eryk’s room has not been touched. His toys, his clothes are all there. I like to smell him on his clothes,” she said, with tears rolling down her cheeks.
Fife councillor Mark Hood, who saw the drama unfold, described the events of that day as a ”horrific tragedy”.
”I saw the mother and the look of anguish on her face will stay with me forever,” he said. ”It was probably the worst thing I have ever witnessed she was in complete and utter distress.”
The father of twin girls said the dangers were ”not immediately obvious”.
”The Esplanade was busy with lots of families. People were attracted by the large waves and there were a lot of kids there who were wet. There was a lot of water coming over but I’ve seen it worse. And it was a relatively nice day.
”I certainly wouldn’t blame the mother in any way. There was little anyone could have done.”£9 million plan to improve safetyThe engineer responsible for a £9 million upgrade of the sea wall at Kirkcaldy has been urged to ”close the gaps” by Jadwiga Serafin.
Works due to start in the spring will see the concrete wall raised by half a metre to one-and-a half-metres and a new rock armour barrier built, which it is hoped will prevent water crashing on to the Esplanade.
Jadwiga said: ”This place is very dangerous so I hope they do it quickly. It’s very important not for me, for other families. I don’t want another mother to feel this way.
”But they have to close the gaps. Some kind of gate would be good, that’s my suggestion.
”Many of my friends say the same, particularly the ones with lots of kids, because it’s so difficult to watch all of them all of the time.”
In a progress report delivered to a meeting of Kirkcaldy area committee on June 20, consultant engineer Murray Scott, who is in charge of the upgrade, said: ”The raised wall and rock armour revetment will reduce the risk of overtopping and consequential flooding causing a hazard to public safety.”
Speaking to The Courier, he said everyone associated with the project has been hit hard by Eryk’s death.
”It’s a regrettable course of events that has affected us all. It’s a horrific thing for any parent and family to have to deal with. I can’t imagine what it must be like for the mother. It’s just awful.”
He moved to reassure Eryk’s family that the council will do everything possible to prevent a repeat of the tragedy.
”Our aspirations are obviously to improve safety.”
Jadwiga welcomed Mr Scott’s comments, saying: ”That’s the only way to avoid this kind of accident happening again, because the water doesn’t have to be strong. A small child can quite easily be swept away, it doesn’t have to be a powerful wave.”In Wednesday’s Courier: Jadwiga pays tribute to those who helped her in the depths of her despair