A Putnam County teen who was rescued from the bottom of Lake Sinclair Saturday night succumbed to his injuries Sunday at a Macon hospital.
Kayden Weathers, 13, of Long Shoals Road, died at 4:17 p.m. Sunday at Atrium Health Navicent Children’s Care in Macon, said Putnam County Coroner Hollis Harrison. The cause of death is complications associated to drowning, Harrison added.
Kayden was spending the day on July 4th with family and friends on Putnam Beach at the Lake Sinclair Recreation Area, Putnam County Sheriff Howard Sills said. A friend told Putnam Deputy Sheriff Hollie Collins that Kayden was out in the lake, holding onto the buoy line that separates the deep water from the shallow water. The friend said he heard Kayden call out to him and ask for help because he (Kayden) couldn’t swim.
“And by the time he got to where Kayden was, Kayden was nowhere to be found,” Collins’ report reveals.
Collins responded to the 911 call at 7:14 p.m. The caller said the teen was missing, but as Collins drove there, another call came in saying that he had been found under the water, unresponsive, and other swimmers had brought him to shore.
Collins said when she arrived, a Registered Nurse, Tiffany Woodard, was performing CPR on Kayden. Collins and Deputy Sgt. Jim Barbee also took turns doing CPR until paramedics arrived. Collins continued the CPR after Kayden was put in the ambulance, and then Putnam County Fire Department’s first responders took over. The teen’s pulse returned while en route to Putnam General Hospital, according to Collins’ report. He was flown by a medical helicopter from PGH to the Macon hospital.
The tragedy marks the second in as many days on Lake Sinclair. On Friday afternoon, the body of a 34-year-old Habersham County man was recovered by the Baldwin County Public Safety Dive Team. The man and a friend had unintentionally fallen off of a dock in the wee hours of the morning. The friend survived.