{"id":319016,"date":"2026-08-11T22:24:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T22:24:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/319016\/"},"modified":"2026-08-11T22:24:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T22:24:09","slug":"queens-mom-wishes-she-had-been-there-to-save-teen-son-who-drowned-at-rockaway-beach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/319016\/","title":{"rendered":"Queens mom wishes she had been there to save teen son who drowned at Rockaway Beach"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Queens mother mourning her 17-year-old son, who drowned at Rockaway Beach<\/a>, says she could have saved him \u2014 if only she had been there with him that day.<\/p>\n

Patrice Thompson\u2019s son Audley Sykes was swimming with his best friend and the friend\u2019s sister when he got caught in a riptide near Beach 83rd St. about 7:30 p.m. Sunday.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I was there, I would\u2019ve been able to save him,\u201d Thompson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI brought him there every day. I taught him how to swim. He knew how to swim. He wasn\u2019t a strong swimmer but I taught him how to move around in the water. I didn\u2019t get a chance to teach him how to deal with rip currents and tides.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AudleyAudley Sykes. (GoFundMe)<\/p>\n

Audley spontaneously ventured to the beach<\/a> without his mom Sunday after a birthday party planned for Thompson, who turned 39 the day before, got canceled.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will never forget this birthday,\u201d Thompson said. \u201cThis is devastating.\u201d<\/p>\n

Audley was not breathing when he was pulled from the water\u00a0 by FDNY<\/a> first responders and lifeguards. Meanwhile, a lifeguard rescued his struggling 18-year-old pal.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Audley] was under for 15 minutes. The lifeguards pulled [Audley\u2019s friend] first. He was telling them, \u2018Leave me alone. I can get back, go get my friend, get my brother, because he is under the water right now.\u2019\u201d Thompson said. \u201cHe is distraught.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lifeguards had already left their chairs for the day at 6:00 p.m. but remained at their stations nearby to respond to emergencies until 8 p.m. as part of the city\u2019s heat emergency plan. Swimming is prohibited after 6 p.m. on city beaches.<\/p>\n

The rescue effort provoked a massive response including two NYPD helicopters circling low.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone did the best they can do, in regards to firefighters, lifeguards, policemen,\u201d Thompson said. \u201cThey were extremely on top of their game.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"RockawayRockaway Beach near Beach 83rd St. (Gardiner Anderson for New York Daily News)<\/p>\n

Medics rushed both Audley and his friend to St. John\u2019s Episcopal Hospital<\/a>, where the friend was in stable condition, an NYPD spokesperson said. The friend declined comment when reached by the Daily News Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Audley was later transferred to Cohen Children\u2019s Medical Center.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey did the best they could,\u201d said Thompson, who held vigil at his bedside until he died about 11:00 a.m. Monday. \u201cThey hit the ceiling with the drugs and then his potassium spiked and his heart failed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Audley leaves behind six younger brothers.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was the sweetest guy, a bubble of love,\u201d his mother said. \u201cThere were so many people who loved him and enjoyed him and I\u2019m glad they got to experience him because he was a sweet, loving guy. He would do anything for anybody.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"DrowningDrowning victim Audley Sykes. (Courtesy of Family)<\/p>\n

Thompson described her eldest son as an aspiring entrepreneur. He was headed into his senior year at Williamsburg High School For Architecture and Design.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was teaching him business management, hunting, shooting. He wanted to learn what I was doing,\u201d said Thompson, who works in construction. \u201cHe was learning how to [be a] mechanic from his dad.\u201d<\/p>\n

The teen found a passion in playing football for the Rosedale Jets, his local neighborhood team.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith a heavy heart I want to say R.I.P. to one of my favorite players<\/a> that I coached over the past 20 years,\u201d Carlos Jackson posted on Facebook. \u201cI\u2019m going to miss you Audley.\u201d<\/p>\n

His mother said Audley had a special connection to the sport.<\/p>\n

\u201cFootball was the only thing he really got into. He loved football. He is very athletic,\u201d she said. \u201cHe was running and gunning them down. He was very ambidextrous.\u201d<\/p>\n

In his spare time, Audley also enjoyed watching anime.<\/p>\n

Thompson named Audley after her brother who was shot to death in Queens as a young man in 2008. Her brother \u201chad the same love and he gave the same love\u201d as her son, she said.<\/p>\n

Thompson has now created a GoFundMe<\/a> to help cover the costs of Audley\u2019s funeral and for grief counseling for herself and her younger sons.<\/p>\n

\"DrowningDrowning victim Audley Sykes. (Courtesy of Family)<\/p>\n

Thompson said the city should be doing more to prevent drownings, which occur every summer at Rockaway Beach.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re saddened by this tragic loss of life and our hearts go out to the victim\u2019s family and friends,\u201d a Parks Department spokesman said in a statement.<\/p>\n

In May, 18-year-old Brandon Figueroa<\/a> was swept away while swimming with friends at Rockaway Beach near Beach 73rd St. His body was discovered two weeks later, roughly eight miles away near Beach 222nd St. at the tip of Breezy Point.<\/p>\n

Swimming was prohibited on city beaches when Figueroa drowned, as lifeguard season had not yet begun.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere shouldn\u2019t be any reason we are losing people for days and finding them days after,\u201d Thompson said. \u201cWe have been going through this for years.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Queens mother mourning her 17-year-old son, who drowned at Rockaway Beach, says she could have saved him…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":319017,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[262,263,266,85,267,9,24,264,10,12,63,261,122,124,123,265],"class_list":["post-319016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-city","tag-county","tag-crime-and-public-safety","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-county","tag-new-york-news","tag-news","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-crime","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-sub-county-region"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=319016"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319016\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/319017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=319016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=319016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=319016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}