Ok. Well hubby got some more reports this a.m., from his volunteer fire dept. buddy.
There is a gentleman, Waggoner I think, who is a Wildlife and Fish officer or something. He was quoted in the paper earlier this week… went out to work this accident on Monday, and has not left the scene since.
He and another buddy were assigned some piece of shoreline to watch … they were sitting there this morning, having some small talk but watching the water and shore line.
One of them is commenting to the other about how choppy the water is, and then both of them notice some bubbles coming up.
Last night we had a rain, and I wondered … if the rain would change the temperature of the lake and make Lanie come up. My son said the same thing to me this afternoon.
Sure enough, she popped up “like a cork”. What a blessed relief. Not that her parents would ever have her back, but … as a mom, I gotta tell ya, no matter how bad, I’d have to lay hands on her. Even in death.
So they boys tell us: she’s surprisingly whole, from the waist up. Her beautiful face intact. She had swallowed a lot of her own hair … not just a gulp, but way down in her gullet.
She had no visible head trauma. But here’s where the injury gets to be un-survivable: the propellor cut her cross-ways.
I’ve an old Cajun friend from down Louisiana way who always told dark stories about how the old people settled their quarrels. If you want to cut someone to where they won’t float back up, cut them cross-ways. That way all of the body’s air is released.
This is how the propellor cut Lanie. It starts under her right armpit, and crosses below her ritght breast. The propellor ran across her abdomen. Then … somehow her body must have turned in the turbulence … the blade ran down the outside of her right leg, in the place where your outside bluejean seam runs. It cut thru to the bone, essentially flaying her muscle off of her bone.
So death was probably mercifully short. The body wounds would have been fatal on land, much less in the water. Gutted and unable to swim (due to lack of muscle) she gasped for breath and swallowed her own hair.
Just now I had to go hug my own daughter again. She thinks I’m crazy.
Thanks to all who read and listened.
Sweetly Be.