Student Disappears Over Niagara Falls




(Toronto, Ontario) A 20-year-old Japanese female at language school in Toronto, Ayano Tokumasu, was swept over Niagara Falls last weekend and disappeared.

Police said surveillance footage from a nearby visitors centre showed a young woman holding an umbrella, straddling a safety railing and looking at the falls. It appeared as if she was having her picture taken by a friend.

But when she got up to climb back over the railing, she lost her balance and slipped into the rushing waters near the brink of Horseshoe Falls.

Five police and fire departments on both sides of the border spent Sunday evening and Monday morning searching.

Later Monday, police said they were scaling back their search. No body has been found and the young woman is presumed dead.

The student's family in Japan has been notified.