Parents reveal 14-year-old’s tragic last moments after jellyfish attack in front of mum

The parents of 14-year-old Mark Angelo Ligmayo have revealed horrific details from the tragic box jellyfish attack that took his life.

Victim of the Eimeo box jellyfish sting Mark Angelo Ligmayo who tragically lost his life on Saturday.

A 14-year-old killed by a box jellyfish at a Queensland beach has been identified, with his distraught mother revealing she watched the horrific event unfold.

Mark Angelo Ligmayo had been with family at Eimeo Beach in Mackay when he emerged from the water wrapped in two metres of tentacles, prompting screams to break out across the popular beach.

His mother Agnes Guinumtad told the Courier Mail that all she could do as she watched her son groan in pain was pray, saying she could feel the pain rippling across her son’s face.

“I kept praying and praying, I didn’t stop praying, I prayed that he would say something,” she said.

“It’s hard, to see your son trying to overcome it, it’s hard, to see your son dying in front of you,” his father Nick Guinumtad told the paper.

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Mark Angelo Ligmayo died from a box jellyfish sting at Eimeo beach in Mackay on Saturday.

Mark Angelo had only been in waist-high water close to the shore for 10 minutes before he stumbled onto the beach, his arms and legs covered in more than two meters of tentacles.

After collapsing on the sand, lifesavers and beachgoers performed CPR and applied vinegar before ambulances arrived.

He went into cardiac arrest around 2:30pm before dying at Mackay Base Hospital an hour later.

The 14-year-old had only recently moved to Australia, with the Covid-19 pandemic keeping him separated from his father for the past three years.

Making the already heartbreaking situation more tragic, the family had only been reunited since December.

Mark. his sister Nickole and Mrs Guinumtad had spent the past three years in the Philippines, finally able to fly into Queensland, where his father had been working, in December.

Mr Guinumtad had been working in Mackay for 10 years, visiting the Philippines whenever he could as his family waited on visas that would allow them all to be together once more.

Mark’s family have shared new details of the horrific moment the teenager emerged from the water covered in lethal tentacles.

But Covid-19 prolonged the wait, with closed borders preventing any sort of physical reunion.

“It’s hard, so many years I have waited to have my family here,” Mr Guinumtad said.

“I was waiting for it to be complete, for them to come and make it complete.”

Mark Angelo’s family is hoping to be able to send their son’s body back to the Philippines to be buried so his grandparents can say goodbye. A GoFundMe page has been created to help raise the money to send him home.

His death is the third jellyfish sting fatality since 2006. A 17-year-old boy died near Cape York in February 2021.

The box jellyfish in the Mackay Marina. Picture: Megan Love

Box jellyfish are common around northern Queensland in summer. Their tentacles carry millions of barbs with lethal venom that goes through the skin and rapidly travels to the heart. Health authorities advise people to immediately call triple-0 and treat any stings with vinegar. This inactivates the jelly’s nematocysts, which means the tentacles can be removed.

The Guinumtad family made a point to thank all the lifeguards and bystanders for working so hard to try and save their son and to help care for their six-year-old daughter during the tragedy.

Originally published as Parents reveal 14-year-old’s tragic last moments after jellyfish attack in front of mum