Tragedy shattered a quiet Pembroke neighbourhood last night after a three-year old child was found drowned in his neighbour's swimming pool.

Though he was rushed to the hospital, the young boy was pronounced pronounced dead early yesterday evening.

Police and neighbours were called to join in the search for the child after he went missing in Whitney Avenue yesterday afternoon.

“Everyone in the neighbourhood was looking, up and down the hill, every house,” Police media spokesman Dwayne Caines said last night on Whitney Avenue.

Indicating the house with the pool behind him, he added: “They even went to this house.”

Searchers at first disregarded the pool, surrounded by a wall and gates, because it had a cover over it, he said. However one searcher - a Canadian visitor to the Island - then lifted the cover up to look, just in case. He spotted the child's body at the bottom of the pool.

The neighbour shouted for help, Mr. Caines said, and the boy's guardian and a Police officer leapt in to pull the child out.

The child was discovered at about 5.45 p.m. When Mr. Caines was asked at the scene about the reactions of the family to the tragedy, he replied: “This all transpired within the last hour and a half, people are still at the hospital dealing with their new-found reality.”

Later last night he said the boy's identity will not be released until all of the next of kin are notified.