Brothers, 10 and 7, 'playing Spider-Man' fall to their deaths from 11th floor apartment window during lockdown
Two little brothers fell around 110 feet to their deaths while playing 'Spider-Man' together during the coronavirus lockdown.
Ten-year-old Ivan Zakharov and seven-year-old Stepan had reportedly opened the window in their flat in Moscow, Russia and may have practiced jumping out of it. The two talented dancers fell 25 seconds apart from each other as they dived off the 11th floor and died on the spot.
The boys' mother Irina, 41, and their sister Maria, 12, had been in another room. Investigators suspect the brothers had possibly jumped out rather than fallen out as part of a game. Russia has been on lockdown since March 28, with schools closed, The Sun reports.
Children have not been allowed to go out to the local playgrounds either amid the coronavirus pandemic. As per a local paper, Moskovsky Komsomolets, "There were no traces of slipping from the windowsill. The scatter of bodies also confirms another version - the children fell not directly under the windows, but a little further away."
The paper also reported, "Evidently the quarantined children began to fool around - they removed flower pots, opened a window and climbed onto a table. Their fingerprints were above the window. Perhaps they played Spiderman."
Just ten minutes before the tragedy struck, the two had told their mother that they were playing together. The boys' father Yegor, 44, who is the owner of a children's clothes shop chain, had not been home at the time of the incident.
Both Ivan and his brother Stepan had attended Todes which is a famous Russian dance school.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has recently extended the country's coronavirus lockdown until May 11 and has also warned Russian citizens that the worst of the pandemic is still yet to come. As per data from John Hopkins University, the world has seen around 3,582,469 confirmed cases of COVID-19, reports the Daily Star.
Russia has recorded 145,268 confirmed cases of the deadly virus so far while there have been around 1,356 deaths in total. Moscow has become the epicenter of the coronavirus and Russia has been registering new infections almost every day.
Recently, a senior doctor from Russia fell 50 ft from her office window while on a conference call. During the call, she had been told that her hospital would be required to take in coronavirus patients. The mother of two is currently fighting for her life.
Deputy head of Krasnoyarsk region's government Aleksey Podkorytov also said that the reasons for her fall could be very different from what the media is saying. He speculated, "So many things could have happened."
"It could have been because it was Spring, the overall stress, something in her family. It's difficult to say what could have happened. There was nothing extraordinary happening at the time, just a routine conference call with doctors' reports," he revealed.
The tragedy follows reports in Russia that doctors all over the country are quitting their jobs as they protesting against the lack of PPE as they deal with the ongoing coronavirus battle. It has been reported that Russia has conducted more than 2.8 million tests.