CRAWFORD COUNTY — A Wisconsin man drowned on Sunday when he jumped into a southern Indiana lake in an effort to save two women who fell off a towable tube and were struggling to stay afloat.
According to a report from the Indiana Department of Natural Resources, an Indiana Conservation Officer was on boat patrol on Patoka Lake in Crawford County around 2:51 p.m. Sunday when witnesses alerted him to a possible drowning. Multiple 911 calls came in shortly after reporting that a man had disappeared in the water.
Conservation officers said two females were aboard a towable tube affixed to a stationary rental boat by a rope when they fell off the tube and struggled to stay afloat.
Multiple people from the rental boat jumped in to assist and rescued one of the females. One of the people who jumped in to help, Travis Ray St. Martin, 33, of Racine, Wisc., disappeared under the water.
The other female, K'neisha Adams, 25, of Burke, Va., was rescued by a group of people from a separate boat. She was taken by medical helicopter to University of Louisville Hospital and later released.
Conservation officer public safety divers recovered St. Martin's body around 7:30 p.m. Sunday.
The Crawford County Coroner's Office has preliminarily ruled the cause of death as accidental drowning.
Conservation officers said alcohol and drugs are not suspected of being contributing factors.
The DNR said although there were adequate life jackets on the rental boat, none were in use.
