Volunteer responders locate North Eton man’s corpse at Kinchant Dam, near Mackay
Police say the family of a 40-year-old man who died after saving his own daughter’s life have been devastated by the tragedy. PHOTOS, VIDEO.
Emergency Services
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The search at Kinchant Dam has come to a tragic end as a family’s worst fears were realised, the body of their father pulled from the water.
Inspector Glen Cameron, one of the officers in charge of the search efforts, confirmed that a deceased man had been located at 6.50am on Monday.
He was 40 years old and from North Eton.
Inspector Cameron extended his thanks to Volunteer Marine Rescue and State Emergency Service personnel for “assisting QPS and QFES with the search over the last couple of days.”
“Our thoughts go to the family who have sadly lost a loved one.”
While Inspector Cameron said that the circumstances leading to the two entering the lake were still being investigated, he did confirm that the actions of the father “definitely saved his young daughter’s life”.
It is unknown if either were wearing life jackets.
The body was found on the northern side of the dam by volunteer responders close to the water.
“We were prepared to keep looking as long as we needed to,” Inspector Cameron said.
“Our goal was to locate him and bring him back to his family.
“The family is obviously devastated.”
Earlier in the morning the section of Kinchant Dam Rd leading to the boat ramp was shut to all members of the public. It was later reopened.
There had been seven boats out to search the waters, along with divers and sonar gear attached to their vessels, to locate the man who went missing on Saturday.
Divers had left the site in the middle of the afternoon due to fatigue.
The 40-year-old North Eton man went missing after a boating incident in Kinchant Dam at 11.14am on Saturday following reports of a man and girl overboard from a broken-down boat.
The nine-year-old girl was rescued at 11.45am and transported to Mackay Base Hospital as a precaution.
A 42-year-old woman and three other children were safely ashore at 12.29pm.
DIVERS BATTLING POOR VISIBILITY IN WEEDY WATER
Senior Sergeant McDowell explained the difficulty for divers was that the water was not clear and that it was impossible to see anything the deeper they went.
“It’s really hairy, with a lot of weed so the divers can’t get a good look, it’s almost pitch black for them,” he said.
“So we’ve been searching with special sonar gear and if they find something they go down.
“So obviously logs and things are getting inspected and then they come back up.
Senior Sergeant McDowall said the main achievement of the day had been to recover and bring the family’s boat back to shore after it sunk.
“The family were brought back to shore because they couldn’t start the boat, so they were brought back to shore.”
“And then a storm hit. This is after everything.
“The boat was caught in the storm and sank but it was recovered.”
ALMOST 40 PEOPLE JOIN SEARCH EFFORTS
The desperate effort to find a missing father at Kinchant Dam has started again at first light this morning after a rescue team searched for him for hours on Saturday.
It comes after the two parents and their four children ran into trouble when their boat broke down on Saturday morning.
One of the children, a nine-year-old girl, and her father ended up in the water and while she was rescued by a man on a jetski, he disappeared into the water and was still missing as of 5.30pm.
The mother and other children made it back to shore on the boat.
Senior Sergeant Trevor Robson confirmed crews went out searching for a missing man in the water at Kinchant Dam at 7am and the man has not been located as of 11.30am.
Nearly 40 people, including police officers, firefighters and SES and VMR volunteers, are out in the water on flood boats searching for the man along with five divers and an RACQ rescue helicopter.
Just after 12pm a group of boats returned to shore with the family’s boat, which was retrieved from an extremity of the dam.
SES crews tracked the boat up into the boat ramp and used an orange tarp to cover it up.
The boat was taken out to police headquarters just before 1.15pm
The weather conditions at the damn are very windy with the odd rain shower.
Senior Sergeant Robson wanted to especially thank SES and VMR volunteers for their invaluable help and made a call out for people to consider volunteering with them.
“When people go back to work, we will be short on numbers,” he said.
“We won’t stop until we find him”.
A Queensland Police Service spokeswoman said the search resumed at 7am this morning, with all emergency crews including police, SES crews, firefighters, Volunteer Marine Rescue crews all involved to continue the search.
Speaking to reporters at the scene, where a mammoth search and rescue operation was still taking place on Saturday afternoon, Senior Sergeant Trevor Robson said the search would involve having divers go in the lake.
A SES spokeswoman said the rescue team were using flat boats to search the area where the dad was last seen.
Senior Sergeant Robson said the family of six was understood to be local to the area which is about 30km from Mackay.
“We’ve had a number of different boats from all services, seven at one stage with a number of civilians,” Snr Sgt Robson said.
“We’ve had to have those civilians come out of the water after the Harbor Master declared an incident emergency services needed to take over.”
Earlier, police confirmed the mum and two of her children came back on the boat safe to shore at about 12.30pm.
From about 11am onward, multiple police, SES, volunteer marine rescue and firefighting crews arrived at the scene where a search command post was set up.
Several boats were involved in the search and the RACQ CQ helicopter helped from the air.
Snr Sgt Robson said emergency services had been searching the north easterly to north westerly side of the dam.
“We have a rough idea of where he entered the water, however that’s only an approximate at this stage,” he said.
“The biggest challenge was the weather, with the cloud cover it’s very hard to see into the water.
“We had the RACQ helicopter assist us and did a full scan of the dam.
“At this stage we haven’t located him.
“We’ll go until the light fails us today and be back first thing in the morning.”
Visibly distraught family members were also on scene.
“The family are here, obviously they’re very upset about what’s happened,” Snr Sgt Robson said.
“You wouldn’t wish it on your worst enemy.”
However, Snr Sgt Robson said the crews were not searching for the missing man “as though he’s passed away.”
“We want to find him,” he said.
“That’s our aim at the moment, we aren’t considering anything else at this stage.
Reflecting on a similar accident two years ago at the same dam, when the body of a 63-year-old Cairns man was recovered after he fell overboard, Sen Sgt Robson said Kinchant had “its challenges there’s no doubt with the wind, it does make a difference to try and find someone”.
“In any dam or water catchment area there are dangers, every dam has its issues, you can’t underestimate how dangerous it is on the water.
“We ask (that) everyone has their safety equipment and abides by the rules.”
The nine-year-old girl was taken to Mackay Base Hospital in a stable condition.
As night fell, the search was suspended until first light Sunday at which point police divers will join.
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