CARLI NEWELL, Zac’s mother, who works as a journalist at The Pembrokeshire Herald, wrote an emotional post on social media this week thanking the community.

Carli wrote: “As a family, we want to extend our heartfelt thanks to the entire community for your outpouring of love, support and comfort during the most horrendous time we will ever experience. Although we haven’t been able to reply to everyone individually, not a single thing has gone unnoticed.

We have been completely overwhelmed with your gestures and generosity.

No words will ever describe how much your support means to us.

We are sorry if there is anyone we haven’t managed to reply to, but please know, we have found such huge comfort in reading everyone’s comments about our beautiful boy. Everyone has so many stories to tell and photos to share, it’s been incredible to see how many people loved our baby. The amount of lives he has touched in his short years is truly unbelievable and is a credit to his cheeky, mischievous and caring nature.

To Zac’s superhero big brother, Tyler, who jumped back in and tried desperately hard to save Zaccy. You always have and always will be Zac’s best friend and his number one hero. We are so unbelievably proud of you and your bravery.

To the two absolute heroes who first got to zaccy and gave him everything they had to give, so he had the best possible chance, the RNLI, the Coastguard and all emergency services who helped at the scene, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts and soul.

To the phenomenal staff at Glangwili Hospital who worked for almost 7 hours to get our boy stable enough to go to Cardiff. We will never forget your efforts, and without you we would never have got those last few hours to spend with our baby and say goodbye. You were all absolutely amazing and we are forever indebted to you.

Zac really was a one of a kind. There will never be another like our Zaccy boy.

Arrangements are being made to celebrate the life of Zac and we will release them once everything is confirmed.

Again, words cannot express how truly thankful we are to each and every one of you for all you have done and are continuing to do for us.”

The family said they noticed on social media that there was some criticism after a Pembrokeshire Herald car was seen rushing to the scene of the incident, however the family said they would like to confirm it was in fact them making their way to the scene after being contacted by the emergency services.

The staff at The Pembrokeshire Herald wish to express their condolences to the family on the loss of Zac.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with all those affected. Zac was well known to us all, having spent many days during school holidays at the office. We have been, of course, all shocked and saddened by the terrible news, and we have promised to help in any way possible whilst Carli and her family work to rebuild their lives, following this awful tragedy” – Tom Sinclair , Editor.