Three teens drown in Fox River boating accident

An eight-day leadership retreat for students from a Chicago high school ended in tragedy early Friday morning when three students plunged into the chilly Fox River near Algonquin and drowned.

Authorities removed the body of one of the young men, Melvin Choice Jr., 17, of Chicago, from the waters near Camp Algonquin about 6 a.m., and about five hours later recovered the bodies of Jimmie Avant, 18, and Adrian Jones, 16.

The three, all students at North Lawndale College Prep, a charter high school on Chicago's West Side, were among as many as 16 students who left their sleeping quarters at Camp Algonquin about 1 a.m. Friday and attempted to ride paddleboats on the fast-moving river, authorities said.

Unknown to the teens, small drain plugs had been removed from the bottom of the paddleboats for the winter, causing them to sink rapidly once they hit the water.

With the water temperature at just 42 degrees and strong currents under the river surface, the teens found themselves in circumstances in which even trained divers struggle, said Lt. Julie Didier of the Algonquin-Lake in the Hills Fire Protection District.

"It's scary," she said. "The divers are having a hard time, and they're trained to swim in these types of conditions."

Indications are that Avant and Jones were the first to fall into the water and Choice drowned trying to rescue them, authorities said. The boat taken out by the boys, along with five others paddleboats, were recovered from the river, police said.

Camp officials said the plugs, about the size of a wine cork, are removed from the paddleboats for the winter to allow water to drain from their hulls. The water otherwise would freeze, potentially leading to cracks in the hull. Some small boats, like canoes and kayaks, do not have drain plugs.

Because the hole was small, the boats likely did not sink immediately after being launched. But once they began taking on water, Didier said, they would sink rapidly.

All three teens were recovered in the same area about 50 feet off shore and in water eight to 10 feet deep.

Rescue workers were dispatched to the scene at 1:52 a.m. in response to a 911 call, Didier said. She could not confirm reports that the call came from one of the students in the river.

"We made valiant efforts for a couple of hours to rescue them," she said.

In all, 31 students and four teachers from North Lawndale were at Camp Algonquin for a retreat that began Friday, Nov. 7, and was scheduled to end Friday, Nov. 14, said Sgt. Brett Scroggins of the Illinois Department of Natural Resources Conservation Police. The remaining students were bused out of the facility about 9:30 a.m. Friday and returned to a church near school where they met with counselors and waited for their parents.

There are no indications the North Lawndale Prep teachers who were chaperoning the students participated in or were aware of the students' plans, he added, and criminal charges stemming from the drownings are unlikely. For now, investigators are treating the case as a boating accident.

"At this point and time I see no reason to speculate that there would be," he said.

The students were sleeping in a building renovated in 2005 to house refugees of Hurricane Katrina. The building features several separate sleeping rooms along with a large common area, camp officials said.

It is unclear how the students managed to get out of the building without alerting their teachers, police said.

Paul Murray, chief volunteer officer for the McHenry County YMCA, which operates the camp, said the drownings are the first he's aware of since the agency began operating Camp Algonquin in 2005.

Camp Algonquin was founded in 1907 on the site of a former tuberculosis hospital.

Though he is not sure of what exactly students were told about boating, all groups using the facility are given rules asking them to stay away from the river, Murray said. The same rules are posted within the students' sleeping quarters.

The camp requires that all groups have at least one adult per eight students, which the North Lawndale group met. Beyond that, camp director Linda Fauser said, it is up to each group to determine how best to supervise its members.

North Lawndale conducted a similar event at the camp in August 2007 without incident, Fauser said.

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