Coroner: Divers recover body of 18-year-old kayaker from bottom of Ky.’s Lake Cumberland
By APSaturday, May 8, 2010
Coroner: Divers recover kayaker’s body in Ky.
SOMERSET, Ky. — A coroner in Kentucky says divers have retrieved the body of an 18-year-old kayaker, the sixth person in the state to die as a result of last weekend’s flooding.
Pulaski County Coroner Richard New said Saturday that divers used sonar to find the body of Tyler Pickerell, who had gone kayaking Wednesday on Lake Cumberland. Flood waters have inundated the Southeast, including parts of Kentucky, Tennessee and Mississippi.
New says Pickerell’s body was pulled from the lake, about 84 feet deep, on Friday evening. Divers had to use sonar because there was no visibility at that depth. He says an autopsy showed drowning was the cause of death.
The teen had been on the lake with a friend when their kayak started taking on water. They swam for opposite ends of the shore, but Pickerell never made it.
