Just saw a post on the GCP list server about ANOTHER drowning of a kayaker on the Tuolumne. Anyone know more?

Found this news report online at

http://www.uniondemocrat.com/news/story.cfm?story_no=17698



Rafter dies on Tuolumne River

Published: June 27, 2005



A New Jersey man died yesterday during a rafting trip on the Tuolumne River, upriver from Wards Ferry Bridge.

Michael Wallace Eckert, 32, was rafting with four others when he fell from a raft in a section of rapids on the river, said Tuolumne County Sheriff's Sgt. Robin Hunt.

Hunt said the Sheriff's Office received a call about the accident at 4:45 p.m. He said the accident is still under investigation.

A California Highway Patrol helicopter spotted Eckert's body on the river. After landing, the helicopter crew pulled his body out, Hunt said.

Eckert is the second person to die on a Tuolumne County river in the last two weeks. A man was killed June 16 where the Clavey River meets the Tuolumne after his kayak was sucked into a funnel — a pit of water surrounded by rocks — and did not come out. Because of the water level and current, crews have still been unable to recover the kayaker's body.

this accident happened at grey's grindstone.

at high water levels the initial hole becomes very retentive and covers the river from center to right... followed by a kilometer of whitewater.