Four swimmers have died off the North Carolina coast since Monday
A fourth person has died this week after being pulled from the ocean off North Carolina, according to town officials and news outlets.
Two died Wednesday at Kure Beach, and the third was a National Weather Service scientist who is believed to have drowned Monday at Duck on the Outer Banks, according to news outlets.
A fourth person was found Thursday in the ocean off Nags Head, the town said in a release.
Identities have not been released for the two Kure Beach deaths, while the scientist was identified as 58-year-old William Lapenta, director of the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration’s National Centers for Environmental Prediction, according to Duck officials.
The Town of Nags Head identified the fourth swimmer who died as a 51-year-old man from Davidsonville, Maryland.
All four deaths occurred during a period when the National Hurricane Center warned Hurricane Lorenzo in the Mid-Atlantic was creating “life-threatening surf and rip currents” along the East Coast. Lorenzo has since been downgraded to a post-tropical storm.
The first of the deaths at Kure Beach happened around 10:15 a.m. Wednesday, when rescuers pulled an unresponsive man from the water near G Avenue and pronounced him dead, according to The Associated Press. Kure Beach is about 15 miles south of Wilmington.
The second swimmer was found around 7 p.m. in the ocean near J Avenue and he, too, was pronounced dead at the scene, WWAY reported. He was identified as an adult male by WRAL.
Lapenta died around 4:30 p.m. Monday, after rescuers found him unresponsive in the water off Pelican Way beach, according to a news release. He was pronounced dead about 5 p.m. after life-saving measures failed to revive him, officials said.
“While the exact factors that caused the death are unknown, Monday’s surf conditions and a rip current in the area were likely a factor,” Duck officials said in a release.
Officials from Nags Head said rescuers responded to reports of a man floating face down in the ocean around 3 p.m. Thursday. The incident is still under investigation, but they said there were not any red “no swimming” flags posted on the beach at the time.
Most drownings off North Carolina are attributed to rip currents, which can pull swimmers rapidly out to sea, experts say. Many swimmers exhaust themselves trying to fight the current and get back to shore.