Lack of Life Jackets Blamed for Three Deaths on Corps Lakes Over July 4th Holiday
It has been a deadly summer on the three reservoir lakes on the Upper Savannah River.
According to the Corps of Engineers Savannah office, three people died on the lakes over the July 4th weekend and one person died in March.
And all of them could have been prevented had the victims been wearing life jackets.
According to the Corps’ statistics, most recreation fatalities occur outside designated recreational areas managed by the Corps of Engineers.
Over the last five-plus years the Corps has seen about seven fatalities for the entire year on the three reservoir lakes and and in each case, the victims were not wearing a life jacket.
” The thing we urge people to do always is to wear that life jacke, whether you’re in the water or near the water, or on the water in a boat or other water craft,” Corps spokesman Billy Birdwell said. “If you are in, on, or near the water we urgently urge you is to wear that life jacket.”
During the July 4th holiday, a former Clemson running back drowned while swimming in Richard B. Russell Lake, a father drowned in Hartwell Lake after a boat collision, and a teen died from a head injury while diving into J. Strom Thurmond Lake to avoid a fireworks mishap on a dock.
In March, a swimmer drowned on Lake Hartwell when he tried to swim out to the middle of the lake to retrieve his kayak. He also was not wearing a life jacket.
Georgia law requires children age 13 and under to wear a life jacket at all times while on or near the water.
And if you get to the lake and find you don’t have a life jacket with you or not enough life jackets, Birdwell says the Corps will provide them for free.
Tanya Grant, park ranger at Hartwell Dam and Lake, encourages visitors to always wear life jackets while swimming or boating. If they don’t have their own life jacket, visitors can borrow one through the Corps’ Life Jacket Loaner Program.
“At our reservoirs, particularly at those locations where we operate the beaches, there are life jacket lending boards. We put life jackets up of various sizes for people to take and use for the day and then return. We want people to recreate, then put it back on the board for the next person. We want people to live,” he said.
And both the Georgia and South Carolina DNR’s also have free life jacket lending kiosks stationed around Lake Hartwell, including one at the Tugaloo State Park mega ramp in Lavonia.
You can also purchase life jackets at one of the marinas on Lake Hartwell.