Teenager drowns while saving children in Clearwater County, MN

The name of the victim will not be released until later today to allow family time to make notifications.

Sinclair Township, MN — On Monday, August 17th at approximately 3:45 pm, the Clearwater County Sheriff’s Office received a 911 call reporting a drowning near the Clearwater Dam on Clearwater Lake in Sinclair Township in northern Clearwater County.

Deputies from the Clearwater County Sheriff’s Office along with the Clearbrook Fire Department and Bagley Sanford Ambulances all responded to the scene.

According to witnesses, a group of children had been swimming in the river near the dam when some of them were caught up in the turbulent water that was coming over the dam and could not free themselves.

The water level at the dam was considerably higher due to the large amount of rain received recently.

When the first deputy arrived on scene, an eight-year-old juvenile female had been pulled from the water and initially was unresponsive.

Bystanders at the scene had preformed life saving measures and were able to resuscitate her.

An eighteen-year-old female was near the river and CPR was being preformed on her by other bystanders, but she was still unresponsive.

Witnesses has estimated that she had been in the water for approximately ten minutes.

Sanford Life Flight was called to the scene and landed a short distance away.

All life saving measures were preformed, but medics were not able to resuscitate the eighteen-year-old.

According to witnesses, the eighteen-year-old had pulled some of the younger children to safety before she went under the water.

The name of the victim will not be released until later today to allow family time to make notifications.