Drowning adds to summer tragedies at NJ pools, lakes and oceans

✅ A 19-year-old man drowned in Lake Garrison in Elk Township

✅ The man had been reported missing 22 minutes before he was found

✅ Nearly a dozen people men, women and children have drowned in NJ in 2024

ELK TOWNSHIP — The body of a 19-year-old was found in a lake less than a half hour after he was reported missing Saturday afternoon.

Elk Township police said the man went missing at the Lake Garrison recreation area on Buck Road in the Monroeville section just after 2 p.m.

The man was found in the water about 22 minutes later and taken to Inspira Medical Center Mullica Hill where he was pronounced dead.

The identity of the male was not disclosed by police pending notification of family.

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Many drownings this summer in New Jersey

It has been a tragic summer at New Jersey's swimming pools lakes and oceans with nearly a dozen drownings since May.

A man who saved two boys while swimming in the Great Egg Harbor River at Weymouth Furnace County Park on Wednesday later died after he went under. Pablo Hernando Cruz, 49, of the Mays Landing section of Hamilton, had to be rescued by first responders and later died at a hospital. Swimming is not permitted in the river.

Jeysson Ariel Osorio-Reyes, 24, of Jackson, drowned while swimming in the Delaware River near Milford Beach in Pennsylvania, which is across the river from Montague.

Michael Stewart, a 6-year-old from Lumberton, drowned in a pool on the first day of the season at Liberty Lake Day Camp on June 24. Lifeguards tried to revive the boy, who was taken to Virtua Mount Holly Hospital where he was pronounced dead, according to Burlington County Prosecutor LaChia L. Bradshaw.

A Point Pleasant Borough man drowned while swimming in a reservoir that feeds cranberry operations on the Burlington/Ocean county border on June 23.

Two other people died during that same weekend. Edwin Toro-Mejia, 33, of Howell drowned while swimming at Crystal Lake at the Heritage Minerals Quarry. A 79-year-old Morris County man died the same after he disappeared into Lake Hopatcong in Roxbury.

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