It’s what we do...

Fluffy white clouds were floating across the beautiful blue summer sky as divers searched for dead bodies in the dark murky waters at the bottom of the lake.

Actually... it was more pleasant than it sounds as our boat navigated Lake Byllesby in a diver training exercise to locate simulated dead bodies by the Goodhue County Sheriff’s Dive Team.

The team...

Investigator Steve Sutton-Brown leads the team.  Members taking part were:  Deputies Tom McGuire, Rod Roberts, Tom Wolner, Sergeant Jason Johnson and Captain Pat Thompson.  Also working in the exercise were Line Tenders, Tris Matthews and Deputy Jordan Winberg along with Deputy Jay Kindseth and Sergeant Scott Powers. 

  They are trained for rescue and recovery - of people or vehicles.  Recently the team recovered a 1975 Chevrolet Malibu from the Mississippi River that belonged to a person who had drowned 41 years ago.

They also dive for evidence recovery.  This is when someone tries to get rid of objects like weapons: knife, gun. rifle, etc.    

When trying to preserve fingerprints on a recovered weapon, it is brought to the surface in a container including the water so fingerprints can be recovered and it won’t rust.

It’s probably going to be very murky and dark at the bottom of the lake or river so divers may use a grid pattern to feel their way along.

In some cases they may have to search the hulls of barges to detect if they are false and are smuggling drugs, etc.

The divers do not get extra pay for their expertise.

As Deputy Wolner explained with a smile, “We’re a bunch of race horses... this is what we want to do.”

For more information on their equipment, etc. check out the YouTube video - TRIAD: Goodhue County Dive Team.