LAKE POWELL – One person is dead and two more still missing after a boating accident at Lake Powell Thursday morning.
The accident involved a motorboat and a houseboat. According to Kane County Sheriff’s Office, the accident occurred around 8:15 a.m. Thursday at buoy 43 near Dangling Rope Marina. The motorboat – carrying 13 people, seven adults and six children who are mostly family, from South Jordan, Utah – collided with a houseboat. The collision caused the motorboat to overturn.
Sgt. Alan Alldredge of the Kane County Sheriff’s Office said that 57-year-old Marilyn Jackman was confirmed deceased and two other women, Jessica Jackman, 22, of South Jordan, and Valerie Rae Bradshaw, 29, of Sandy, are still reported as missing in the water. Other individuals received minor injuries.
He said alcohol was not a factor in the incident and the family was an avid boating family familiar with the lake. “I get the feeling these are pretty avid boaters and are on the lake quite a bit,” Alldredge said.
Alldredge said the motorboat’s driver, Adrian Jackman, 59, who was the father/grandfather of children in the boat, became distracted by some of the children and didn’t see the houseboat in time.
“So it was an accident,” Alldredge said. “(The driver) turned around to check on a kid walking back and somebody yelled ‘Boat!’ and he looked up and there was the houseboat.”
The motorboat clipped the front corner of the houseboat and flipped over.
Adrian Jackman and his 11-year-old granddaughter were taken by helicopter to a hospital in Flagstaff, Ariz. with injuries that were not life threatening. Another person was taken by ambulance to Page, Ariz. All three individuals were released from the hospital the same day.
The the rest of the group was taken to Wahweep Marina and it was confirmed all of the children were wearing life jackets.
No one on the houseboat was injured and there was no connection between the two boating parties.
Alldredge said the National Park Service at Lake Powell has a very skilled and well trained dive team who worked throughout Thursday afternoon and early evening to try and find the missing individuals and continue to do so today.
The water is about 400 feet deep at the crash site in an area of the lake that was about 200 yards shore-to-shore. The dive team has some remote camera and sonar equipment which will allow them to search that deep. The Utah Department of Public Safety dive team has also been requested and should arrive Friday night or Saturday Morning. They will be using their side-scan sonar to search the crash area to try and find the missing individuals.
Officials from National Park Service, Utah State Parks, and Kane County Sheriff’s Office will continue working together on the investigation of the incident, and location of the missing individuals.
“As we enter the busy summer season at the lake,” Alldredge said in a statement, “we encourage everyone to be extremely cautious of other traffic and to always wear life jackets.”
“With the release of the family’s names” Alldredge said, “we would ask everyone to please honor their privacy as they endure this ongoing ordeal.
Ed note: Updated at 1:10 p.m., June 21, 2013
St. George News Assistant Editor Mori Kessler contributed to this story.
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