Body pulled from lake near Juanita Beach

Police pulled a body from Lake Washington just after noon Friday at Juanita Beach. Officials believe it is a man that went missing the night before.

That man is believed to be in his 50s and left Ivar’s Restuarant on Lake Union with a friend at about 10:30 p.m. on a 16-foot runabout Thursday. They headed to the east side of Lake Washington. Sometime during the trip the boat ran out of gas and drifted north of the 520 bridge.

The missing man got into the water but the wind pushed the boat away. The man could not swim fast enough to get back to the boat. The other man, 49, who was driving the boat, got into the water with a seat cushion trying to help his friend and the boat drifted away from him as well. The 49-year-old man with the seat cushion could not reach his friend and lost sight of him.

The man with the seat cushion swam approximately 90 minutes until he reached Kirkland shore at about 12:35 a.m. and called police.

The Kirkland Police notified the King County Sheriff’s Office and a search was started for the missing man. The boat was found an hour later just north of Juanita Park and no trace of the man had been found until the following afternoon. As of Reporter’s deadline, the King County Medical Examiner’s office had not released the man’s autopsy results.

Contact Kirkland Reporter Staff Writer Matt Phelps at mphelps@kirklandreporter.com or 425-822-9166 ext. 5052.

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