DORA FALCONS Headed to the MAKE HISTORY! zark CounTy Class 1 Final 4! First time ever for Falcons basketball FRIDAY, MARCH 8 & team to play in state semifinals SATURDAY, MARCH 9 Times SEE PAGES 14-15 75¢ GAINESVILLE, Mo. www.ozArkcouNtytimes.coM wEdNESdAy, MArcH 6, 2019 Search team perseveres despite grim circumstances to find fisherman’s body By Sue Ann Jones,
[email protected] By water, land and air, in temperatures that sank into the single digits, a team of determined Ozark Countians and Missouri State Highway Patrol Water Division personnel searched Saturday, Sunday and Monday for Mike Meidell, 52, of West Plains, who launched his fishing boat Friday onto Norfork Lake at Udall – and did Spring not return. MSHP officers found Meidell’s body and his overturned boat Monday morning on Bryant Creek about a half-mile north of Cook’s Landing, a Missouri Department forward of Conservation river access, according to an online MSHP drowning incident report. 2 a.m. The MSHP report says the accident occurred when the 2018 Lowe utility boat “side impacted” a debris pile in the stream, capsizing, and entrapping Meidell in the Sunday, debris pile, causing him to drown. The accident was investigated by MSHP Cpl. J. R. Roberts assisted by MSgt. B. D. Foster, Cpl. L. B. Monahan and Trooper C. P. March 10 Chatman. It was MSHP Troop G’s first drowning fatality of 2019. This week’s sheriff’s dispatch log (see page 12) shows that a call came in at 5:23 p.m. Saturday, March 2, saying Meidell hadn’t been heard from since Thursday, Voter when he had launched his boat onto Norfork Lake at Udall.