Boy Feared Drowned Off Oxnard Beach

A 15-year-old Oxnard youth who was learning to swim was presumed drowned Friday in heavy surf and dangerous rip currents at unguarded and often dangerous Oxnard State Beach.

The boy had been swimming with two friends for more than an hour just off the coast when strong winds and heavy swells converged to create dangerous conditions.

Witnesses saw the boys clinging to one another as they fought to stay afloat and get to the beach.

Oscar Tellez, 20, and his brother Luis, 16, made it to shore. Alex Cabrera did not.

“I just saw his head go down and he never came back up,” said Susan Gelt, a vacationer from Santa Clarita.

With the closest lifeguards a mile down the coast, Bob Schumacher, of Chandler, Ariz., ran down the beach and grabbed his boogie-boarding, 16-year-old son, Robbie, who ran back to the struggling boys and paddled out to help.

He managed to help Luis Tellez pull his older brother to shore.

Oxnard firefighters, the U.S. Coast Guard and the Channel Islands Harbor Patrol scoured the coastline in boats and three helicopters as county lifeguards swam in search of the boy’s body.

The three swimmers held on to one another as rip currents pulled them out to sea and down the beach. They became separated when a large wave crashed over them, said Oxnard Fire Department Capt. Kevin Schroepfer.

Oxnard Fire Chaplain Dan Green said Cabrera had managed to again latch on to Oscar Tellez, the oldest and strongest of the three. But fearing for his own life, Tellez had to push the younger boy away.

“They’re just so shook up right now,” Green said. “They’re remorseful. They’re feeling that they should have tried a little harder, that they should have stayed out there. The best thing to tell them is they did the best job they possibly could.”

Times staff writer Mack Reed contributed to this story.