Beach closed at Huron after 2nd swimmer lost
HURON — City officials have shut down a Lake Erie beach after a second swimmer was lost there in less than a month.
Nickel Plate Beach will be closed until further notice while Huron looks at ways to improve safety at the beach, about 50 miles west of Cleveland.
Huron City Manager Andy White said high water and strong winds have been creating dangerous conditions.
Search crews have been looking for a 29-year-old woman who was swimming with her family on Sunday when she went under.
Earlier this month, an 18-year-old man drowned while helping a group struggling in the water.
Nearby in the Port Clinton area, the U.S. Coast Guard, Canadian Air Force, Ohio Department of Natural Resources and several local law enforcement agencies searched Lake Erie for 14 hours, covering 693 square miles, before rescuing a jet skier Monday morning, according to the Coast Guard.
A charter boat that responded to the Urgent Marine Information Broadcast rescued the 57-year-old woman about 9:30 a.m. Monday a halfmile north of the mouth of the Portage River, a news release said.
Meanwhile, in far northeastern Ohio, a Cleveland youth, Hector S. Lozada, 17, died Sunday while swimming in Lake Erie at Conneaut Township Park, Conneaut Fire Chief Steve Lee said. He was the 40th person to drown in Lake Erie this summer, the third in the Ashtabula area.
Lozada was trying to swim from one of the beach’s break walls to another when he went under the water, Lee said. The Conneaut Police Department used a boat to search the lake for the boy.
On May 18, James Wells, 19, and Cory Althar, 38, both of Geneva, drowned on a fishing trip from the Geneva State Park marina, according to investigators with the Ashtabula County coroner’s office.
A Madison woman, Melissa Zirkle, is pushing for increased water safety education, according to the Great Lakes Surf Rescue Project. Zirkle's 13-year-old son, Jermaine, drowned six years ago in Lake Erie.
Zirkle said she’s made it her mission to honor her son’s memory through water safety education.
“My main focus is prevention,” she said. “My son died in Lake Erie. Many people have died before and after my son in Lake Erie. If there was more awareness about drownings, my son and many others would still be here.”
Zirkle’s efforts, which include water safety classes for area students in partnership with the Great Lakes Surf Rescue Project, earned her the honor of Superhero of the Year in 2016 from the Great Lakes Water Safety Consortium.
“We need to educate the public about the dangers of the lake,” she said. “Waves look like a lot of fun to jump in and dive through until you learn about the real danger. We need to teach this in schools, just like we teach about fires and active shooters.”
Statistics show 117 people drowned in the Great Lakes last year, and 88 in 2017, for a total of 780 since 2010, according to the Great Lakes Surf Rescue Project.
Zirkle believes government and elected officials should push water safety education in the schools, including information on rip currents, structural currents, offshore winds and how to help someone who is drowning.
“I am working very hard to prevent another loss,” she said. “We need to come together and do better for our children. We need to be vigilant in prevention so we can protect them.”
One issue is that Lake Erie water levels have been at an all-time high this summer.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has been tracking the highs and lows for a century, for each of the Great Lakes. Erie hit its all-time low in 1934 (though in 1964, it came close to setting a new low). Until this summer, Erie’s all-time high was in 1986.
The record high water — 33 inches above normal — has obliterated beaches, submerged docks and eroded yards. People don rain boots just to reach their boats.
The water should soon recede, thanks to the natural cycle, which peaks in June. The dry spell that kicked off July kept more water from pouring into the lakes.
About 92 percent of the water in Lake Erie comes from the upper lakes, through Lake St. Clair and the Detroit River, into Lake Erie. Lake Erie then flows into the Niagara River, into Lake Ontario.
This past Sunday, Lake Erie was still at 574.62 feet above sea level, exactly the same as the June average, which set the all-time high. That’s more than a foot higher than it was in July 2018 and 4.4 inches higher than it was in 1986.