7-year-old’s body found days after group of tubers went over a dam in North Carolina

By Keith Allen and Alta Spells, CNN

The body of a 7-year-old boy was found Sunday, four days after a group of tubers went over a dam on the Dan River in North Carolina, officials said.

A 911 call alerted emergency responders to the body, which was recovered from the river near Draper Landing in Eden, according to a statement from the Rockingham County Department of Emergency Services.

The boy was part of a group of nine tubers who went over a dam Wednesday evening near a Duke Energy power plant.

Four of the tubers were found alive Thursday when “an astute power plant worker saw something” and called 911, Rockingham County Sheriff’s Office Public Information Officer Lt. Kevin Suthard said.

The bodies of three other tubers were recovered Thursday. One of the tubers is still missing.

Emergency officials conducted another search of the river Sunday between the dam and where the boy’s body was found, but didn’t locate the final victim. A second search of the river near the North Carolina-Virginia border also didn’t turn up anything, the statement said.

Rockingham County officials believed the release of water from Belews Lake Saturday night would increase river flow making it “very likely” for victims to surface.