Divers end search for body of Prospect bridge jumper

PROSPECT – Marine Patrol divers spent the weekend searching the waters beneath the Penobscot Narrows Bridge but were unable to locate the body of the teenage boy who leaped to his death last week.

Waldo County Chief Deputy Sheriff Robert Keating said the divers worked the Penobscot River on Saturday and Sunday, and even though they were aided by a side-scanning sonar device their efforts were unsuccessful. He said the Marine Patrol will continue to monitor the river, but the active search for the body had been suspended.

“They will continue to monitor the river, but there is no longer a full-scale search,” Keating said Tuesday.

Keating said that authorities were almost certain that the person who jumped from the bridge was the same 17-year-old Hancock County boy who was reported missing by his family after he failed to come home from Bucksport High School last Monday afternoon. He said the parents had been kept abreast of the situation and were resigned to the likelihood that it was their son who jumped. Keating declined to identify the boy.

“Our investigation and the facts we know lead to no other conclusion than that the young man that went over the bridge was the same young man that was reported missing in Hancock County after not coming home from school,” Keating said. “Can I say we’re 100 percent certain? That would be wrong because we haven’t found him. But all indications point to the missing young man.”

Three witnesses saw the boy jump off the Prospect side of the bridge at approximately 7 p.m. Monday, March 5. They said the boy was not wearing a shirt and had been seen walking down the center lane before going over the side.

One witness told authorities he was driving west toward Prospect and saw a young male without a shirt lying down in the median between the lanes. The man said he stopped his vehicle and watched the youth get up and walk toward the guardrail.

Keating said the witness got within a few feet of the boy and by that time he was on the outboard side of the railing. He said that when he told the boy not to jump, the boy let go. The travel deck of the bridge is 155 feet above the river at high tide, which was at 11:55 p.m. Monday.

The Marine Patrol, U.S. Coast Guard and Bucksport Fire Department rushed to the scene and began a rescue operation. They searched up and down the river for about four hours before suspending the operation. Subzero temperatures kept searchers off the water for the next few days until the weather improved over the weekend.