Boy Dies After Falling Into Grease Tank

A 5-year-old boy died Tuesday after falling into a grease trap outside the hotel where his parents were attending a New Year’s Day party.

Nil A. Roy never regained consciousness after he choked on the mixture of waste oil and water Monday night.

Authorities said he fell through a circular opening into an underground tank that separates oil and grease from kitchen wastewater.

Reports from Tuesday’s autopsy will not be complete for a week or two, but “as far as we know, it’ll be ruled accidental drowning,” coroner’s investigator Clay Stewart said.

Children alerted the adults that Nil had fallen in. One guest, Jaiprakash Patel, leaned head-first into the tank.

“The first time I went in, I couldn’t find anyone,” Patel said. “Someone said, ‘Someone is still in there,’ so I yelled, ‘Someone hold my legs!’

“I went in again, and was moving my arm around. I found a leg and grabbed hold of it tight. I was yelling, ‘Pull me up!’ They pulled me up fast.”

Nil’s father, Dr. Anand Roy, tried to clear his son’s airway and start cardiopulmonary resuscitation but couldn’t, fire Capt. C.D. Clary said.

A rescue crew suctioned a least a pint of “goop” out of the boy’s windpipe.