[ad_1]
The group was rescued Thursday with the help of the Austin Police Department’s Lake Patrol Unit and other first responders. The authorities said the situation could have been much worse had the officers not turned up so quickly.
“This would have been very tragic if they had crossed the dam,” assistant chief of police Scott Perry said at a news conference Friday. “It’s a very high dam and there may have been serious casualties if not loss of life because of it.”
Perry said the group, who was visiting from out of town, was touring Lady Bird Lake on an electric boat Thursday afternoon and approached the dam’s drain stream.
Officer Bradley Smith, of the police department’s Lake Patrol unit, said during the press conference that they were distracted and did not notice that the boat had passed two marked buoys by notifying them of the turn. Smith was one of the three Lake Austin Patrol officers who participated in the rescue.
“When they realized they were about to reach the dam, they tried to turn around to avoid it, but the suction force was too strong and it pulled them into the dam,” Smith said.
Perry said the boat had settled over the drain, and he didn’t have enough strength to get away. Smith said the group contacted the boat service company, which was able to hook up the boat and prevent it from moving further.
Perry added that Lake Patrol officers were already in the lake and were able to reach the two boats and tow them to safety.
Smith said the boat was so close to the edge of the dam that it was “swinging” out of it.
“It was very annoying, because when you approach the boat you have to make sure you don’t wake it up so it doesn’t fall over the edge, but you still have to get there fast enough before it actually falls off the edge,” Smith said. .”
Authorities said the four people who were rescued were calm and unharmed. None of them requested emergency help, according to a Twitter post from the Austin Travis County EMS Center.
.
[ad_2]
Picture Credit!