Boy Who Fell in Sand Dune Walking, Eating

The news continues to get better for a 6-year-old boy who was buried for three hours under sand at the Indiana Dunes last week.

According to Dr. Rachel Wolfson of the University of Chicago Medicine Comer Children's Hospital, Nathan Woessner is now able to get out of bed and walk with assistance, and is also eating for the first time. The boy remains in serious condition.

Woessner fell into a sinkhole sometime after 4 p.m. July 12 at Mt. Baldy in Michigan City, Ind.

Woessner's grandfather, Pastor Don Reul, said the boy was walking to the top of the popular dune with his dad, an adult friend of the family and another boy when he fell.

"They immediately went back, and he was nowhere to be seen," Reul said. "The ground had swallowed him up."

Doctors said Monday they expect the boy to be released from the hospital within 10 to 14 days. His condition had been listed as critical before Thursday.

The Mount Baldy area at the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore will remain closed indefinitely following the accident.