ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq – The search for seven-year-old Arvan Sihad’s body, who drowned in the Great Zab river on Friday is still underway, with authorities citing strong currents and muddiness as obstructing their search efforts.

Sihad, originally from Duhok, visited his grandparents in Amedi’s Deraluk subdistrict with his father for the Eid al-Adha, Sihad’s grandfather told The New Region. The seven-year-old then left his grandparent’s house without anyone’s knowledge, shortly after which the news of his drowning reached his family.

“We have asked for the water flow to the river to be reduced from the Deraluk dam and and Gali Rashava,” Kareem Qasim, a family member of Sihad told The New Region, so that they can find Sihad, and not suffer the same fate as Avesta Yousef, a 27-year-old woman from Erbil who fell into a river in Mergasor during a picnic in early April, whose body has yet to be located despite strenuous search efforts. 

Over 15 hours after the incident, rescue teams have continued their search for the child’s body to no avail, Rebar Sdiq, Deraluk subdistrict director, told The New Region on Saturday, adding that arrangements are being made to reduce the water level of the river for half an hour in the afternoon to assist the search at the request of Sihad’s family.

The Great Zab is a 400-kilometer long body of water that stretches from Turkey through the Kurdistan Region and merges with Iraq’s Tigris river south of Mosul, its torrential nature and large size pose difficulties in the way of rescue teams to carry out searches.