Kid dies after hiding in tumble dryer

LONDON - A four-year-old child in Britain who loved playing hide and seek died after he hid inside a tumble dryer.

Sonny Gibson was locked inside the machine for up to an hour Monday while his family searched for him in the nearby area.

His mother - Anne Shepherd - had gone shopping and returned to find him missing. A neighbour said the child was being looked after by his older siblings, the Daily Mirror reported Tuesday.

“I’ve been told he was playing hide and seek while they were in the front room. He climbed into the dryer and shut the door. God knows what it must have been like for the poor mite,” the neighbour said.

Police spotted his lifeless body inside the dryer at his home in Ashbourne, Derbyshire, 198 km from London. Emergency crew tried desperately to save him but Sonny was

pronounced dead at the scene.

It was, however, not known whether the tumble dryer had been going through its cycle with the child inside or he suffocated.

Neighbours said the child loved playing hide and seek and was “always trying to give his older brothers and sister a surprise”.

“It’s a terrible way for anyone to go. But he was so young and such a real lovely lad that it seems to make it even more awful. He had just finished at nursery. This is the first day of the summer holidays. What a terrible way to start,” a neighbour said.