Three children were playing outside in Live Oak (Florida) yesterday when the disaster struck. The little ones had found no better than to climb into a freezer that was outside in the garden and was not connected yet. But the door closed behind them and then blocked. The children were trapped as rats and did not survive.

Two children – a boy (6) and a girl (1) – were brother and sister and lived with their grandmother. The third child was a girl (4) who lived together with her mother on the same domain.

One of the women was asleep when the children were playing outside in anticipation of her night shift. At that moment the other woman was freshening up in the bathroom. She could not find the children afterwards, after which the women began to search the domain together.

Eventually they found the children in the freezer that had recently been purchased, but had not yet been connected. The women tried to resuscitate the little ones and alerted the emergency services, but all help came too late. The children were declared dead in the hospital.

There is an investigation into the tragic deaths going on, an autopsy has yet to be carried out, according to local media. So far, the police have announced that the freezer was second-hand and that the door was blocked after the children had climbed into it. The lock would have been faulty and had not yet been repaired.

“Words cannot describe how deeply sad I am,” said sheriff Sam St. John during a press conference. “We have all been touched in our hearts.”