AN investigation was launched today after a 10-year-old boy drowned while on a school trip in the Lake District.

Max Palmer's mother Patricia tried to save him but was also swept downstream and was being treated in hospital today after being pulled unconscious from the water.

The tragedy happened when the group was bathing in the small river near Glenridding, Cumbria, police said.

Inspector Paul Kissack said it was not clear whether the boy was himself a member of the school or whether he was accompanying his mother, a 37-year-old educational support assistant on the school trip from Fleetwood.

The other children on the trip were around two years older than Max, he said.

Mrs Palmer and Max were both pulled unconscious from the water 100 yards further down the river, Insp Kissack said.

Patterdale mountain rescue team, out on a training exercise in the area, rushed to the river where they managed to resuscitate Mrs Palmer.

But the team doctor pronounced the boy dead at the scene.

Mrs Palmer was airlifted to Furness General Hospital suffering from mild hypothermia.

She was kept in hospital overnight. Her husband Mark travelled from their home in Fleetwood to be at her bedside.

An investigation involving both the police and the Health and Safety Executive has been launched and the coroner informed.