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Jul 2, 2008 10:22 pm US/Central
N. Texas Family Witnesses Father's Drowning
FORT WORTH (CBS 11 / TXA 21) ―
A North Texas man who went to a lake to go fishing with family members drowned. It happened Wednesday night at Marine Creek Lake in Fort Worth.
As divers from Fort Worth Fire Rescue headed into Marine Creek Lake, Martin Tavera's family prayed on the shoreline for a miracle.
Divers spent more than two hours searching the lake before they found his body. Tragically, two of the victim's kids were at the lake when he went under.
"We were just putting out stuff over there. All of a sudden, we see our cousin telling us that our uncle drowned," said Victor Lopez, the victim's nephew.
Family members say Tavera came to the lake with his son, his daughter, a niece and a nephew. As they prepared to go fishing, their inflatable raft started floating away from the shoreline. Tavera jumped in and tried to catch it and ended up in distress.
"His arms were flapping around," said Lopez.
"He went down. I thought maybe it was a joke," said Wesley Shackelford. "He was going down. He was gonna come back up. He did not come back up." Shackelford is one of three men who dove in and tried to help.
"I was telling them, 'Hey, where is he at? Where is he at? Where? Where?' Yelling at people on the shore," Shackelford said.
But he said it's hard to see under water. "It's about green to blackish looking, and it's very hard," said Shackelford. "So even three to four foot down, you're seeing green."
The witnesses say they were forced to give up after finding no sign of Tavera.
"I went down and dived many times. They were trying to point me to the way of where he was. I was in the best area I could be in," Shackelford said. "I feel so sorry I coudn't save him."
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