(NASHVILLE, Tenn., Aug 22, 2014) – Two quick-thinking park rangers from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Nashville District played a critical role in helping authorities find a missing camper several weeks ago at the Nashville Shores campground located at the J. Percy Priest lake.
While on patrol on Aug. 3, 2014 at J. Percy Priest lake, Nashville District Park Rangers Trey Church and Matthew Leftwich responded to a cell phone news alert that a 29-year-old male was missing from a rental cabin at Nashville Shores.
The rangers received a description of the missing person and last know location from Nashville Metro Police detectives and the Office of Emergency Management. They kept a watchful eye and noticed the missing person in a vacant parking lot who fit the description of the missing man, and quickly notified law enforcement.
“As Park Rangers, part of our job is to be alert and attentive,” said Church. “If we had not been monitoring our cell phone news alerts we would have not heard the news of the missing camper.” said Church.
Church said authorities looking for the missing person had no idea if he had drowned, slipped into the water, hurt, and they had had no idea what they would find.
“I’m glad we found him alive and not floating in the water,” said Church. “We had no idea of his whereabouts but continued to watch our social media sites and listen to the radio.”
“We just patrolled up and down the shoreline to hopefully see if he was either in the area or in the water washed up,” said Church. “I’m glad we found him alive.”
J. Percy Priest Resource Manager Todd Yann said rangers have a very important job and are familiar with the areas on the lake, take pride in contributing to saving a life.
“J. Percy Priest Lake is one of the largest lakes in the country, we have 6 million visitors annually,” said Yann, “Rangers are there to protect the environment, features, recreation facilities, and also to help keep the visitors to our lakes safe.”
For more information on the project see http://www.lrn.usace.army.mil/Locations/Lakes/JPercyPriestLake.aspx