Search For Missing Swimmer Put On Hold
Sonora, CA – A search for a possible drowning victim at God’s Bath swimming hole in the Stanislaus National Forest has been temporarily suspended.
Hearing of the news, relatives of the victims from the east coast contacted Clarke Broadcasting, questioning why? We reached out to Tuolumne County Sheriff’s spokesperson Jacob Ostoich for more information on that decision. He told us that the last report that they had from the witnesses on the scene was that the victim jumped into the water and did not resurface, as we earlier reported here. Sgt. Ostoich advised, “Based on that, we believe that the current took him down. Given the fast-moving current and the rocky conditions, there is a possibility he could be stuck under a rock. If that’s the case, it’s just too dangerous because of the conditions.”
Those conditions, according to Sgt. Ostoich, are due to the snowmelt from the Sierra Nevada Mountains raising the water level and causing a swift undertow at the God’s Bath swimming hole. We relayed that information to the relatives of the 29-year-old victim from San Jose, whose name we are not using because the sheriff’s office has not officially released it.
Trevor Alexander, from Virginia, called the victim his best friend, the guy who would take care of everyone and be there if you needed him. Alexander stated, “You just feel powerless really. I understand danger is danger, but we just wanted to exhaust every single option before just giving up in case he was alive, is alive.”
Sgt. Ostoich stressed, “We have not abandoned the search by any means, just as far as any type of dive operation to go into the water that is on hold until conditions are a little better, whether the water starts to slow down or drops.”
Now it is just a waiting game to see when divers can safely get back into the God’s Bath waters to begin the search again. Currently, Sgt. Ostoich outlined that the plan is to check the waters weekly, or more often, to see when search and rescue dive teams can get back into the water safely.
