Three people were still missing Sunday after a boat overturned offshore from the YMCA Camp on Deer Island in Lake Pepin. The Pepin County Sheriff's Office got the call around 10:45 p.m. Saturday, after people were reported screaming for help in the water.
Officers found three survivors clinging to the pontoon boat and learned that three additional occupants had not been located. By 10:30 a.m. Sunday, the search and rescue operation was still underway.
Pepin County search effort
The response expanded quickly into a large-scale search and rescue operation, with rescue boats, drones, helicopters, and other resources in use. The Wabasha County Sheriff's Office said agencies from Minnesota and Wisconsin were responding to the boating incident.
That kind of response is designed to widen the search area fast when people are reported missing on open water. On Lake Pepin, crews were working from the spot where the overturned pontoon boat was found just offshore from the YMCA Camp to the surrounding water.
Lake Pepin boat details
Authorities said the incident occurred near the Deer Island YMCA Camp and that no campers or staff were involved. The identities of the missing people had not been released.
Three survivors were found on the boat, but three other occupants were still missing; that is the central fact driving the search. A reader affected by the incident now knows the operation remained active Sunday morning, with no public request for assistance from either sheriff’s office.
For now, the open question is the one rescuers were still trying to answer on Lake Pepin: where the three missing people are, and whether the ongoing search and rescue operation can reach them in time.
