Authorities end search for missing boater.

By Larry Hartstein and Ty Tagami
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Rescuers in Gwinnett County called off their search for a missing boater on the Chattahoochee River at nightfall Sunday.

Authorities had been searching since around noon for a man in his late 50s who was in a small fishing boat that capsized Sunday morning.

When the boat carrying two men overturned about 11:40 a.m. south of McGinnis Ferry Road, a boater nearby pulled one of them from the water, Gwinnett Fire Capt. Tommy Rutledge said.

"He was not able to pull the second man from the water," Rutledge said. "He lost contact with him and he has not resurfaced."

The man who was rescued was conscious and alert but showing signs of hypothermia. He was taken to Gwinnett Medical Center.

The temperature in the water was in the mid-40s, Rutledge said. At that temperature, he added, "It doesn't take more than just a few minutes to feel the effects of hypothermia."

Authorities are withholding the names of both men from the capsized boat. Rutledge said the search was called off around 6 p.m. Oversight of the operation was handed over to the Georgia Department of Natural Resources. The agency will start a recovery operation come daybreak Monday.

"That window of the operation for a live rescue is pretty much diminished," Rutledge said around 7:30 p.m.

Firefighters trained for water rescue searched an 8- to 10-mile stretch of the river while a Gwinnett County police helicopter flew overhead. The searchers, equipped with a sonar device, concentrated their efforts between McGinnis Ferry Road and Medlock Bridge Road. They recovered the aluminum John Boat nearly a mile south of McGinnis Ferry Road.

The search involved personnel from Gwinnett and Forsyth counties, the city of Johns Creek and the Georgia Department of Natural Resources.

It was the second incident firefighters responded to on the river Sunday. About 10:15 a.m., Gwinnett's Swiftwater Rescue Team pulled to safety a fisherman who was clinging to a tree branch.

Rutledge said the sunny weather likely brought out more boaters Sunday. At the same time, the Army Corps of Engineers released water from the Buford Dam to operate the power plant that provides electricity for the lake.

"They had stopped generating water at the dam about 11:10 this morning," Rutledge said. "The current quickens and the water rises and it takes several hours for that to recede. We're being told the water in this general area won't recede completely to normal levels until 7 p.m."