A 17-year-old boy drowned after getting trapped in a storm drain in Oxfordshire, police said today.

The teenager was playing with a group of young people in a field off Eastfield Road, Witney, when he got trapped by rising floodwaters between 8.15 and 8.30pm last night.

A Thames Valley Police spokeswoman said: “The boy got trapped beneath a concrete culvert in a flooded area. Emergency services attended and the boy was taken to John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford where he was pronounced dead.”

Another boy rescued in the same incident is receiving treatment for hypothermia.

Oxfordshire was the hardest hit county when sudden heavy rain caused flash flooding in parts of South East England yesterday, with some areas receiving the month's average rainfall for June in just a few hours. Oxfordshire county council had to close roads and evaucate a row of homes in the Tiddington area.

The Oxford Mail reported that the teenagers in Witney had been playing in rising floodwaters. It quoted eyewitnesses who told of a "torrent" of water running off a hill, into a stream and through a metal grill, which takes floodwater underneath Eastfield Road.

Ali Hagenan, 35, who lives nearby, told the newspaper: "I went out when I saw the helicopter and five or six ambulances and fire crews, but we were all pushed back.

"I saw them come out of the water with a lad and they gave him CPR for a couple of minutes. It was shocking to see all this going on and our hearts must go out to all involved."

Mike Poole, of Eastfield Road, said: "It gets ferociously deep out there. It had been absolutely chucking it down.

"I saw 30 to 40 firefighters and ambulance crew turn up and they were giving one of the kids CPR on the ground. I saw one come out on a stretcher and one being put into an ambulance."

In a comment on the Oxford Mail website a reader identifying herself as Vanessa, from Eastfield Road, wrote: "Maybe now they will do something about the floods to prevent this happening in the future.

"Eastfield Road has flooded so many times now and ruined so many peoples homes and the government should take serious action to stop the flooding. It will prove cost efficient in the long run, and save the children who do for whatever reason play in the floods."

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