The bodies of three men who were believed to have disappeared on Tuesday evening while fishing and swimming in the Mississippi River near Memphis, Tennessee, were found Wednesday, local authorities said.

Three men were reported missing about 7:15 p.m. Tuesday and were last seen on a sandbar south of a boat ramp in Meeman-Shelby Forest State Park in Shelby County, Tennessee, its sheriff’s office said in a statement posted online.

Two bodies were found Wednesday around 11 a.m. south of the Meeman-Shelby Forest State Park boat ramp, authorities said. A third was found in that same area around 12:45 p.m.

The three bodies are “presumably” those of the men reported missing, the sheriff’s office said, and awaited identification by next of kin. Their names have not been released.

The local authorities searched for the men Tuesday night until 10:30 p.m. and resumed Wednesday around 9:40 a.m. Three boats were in the water searching within 45 minutes of receiving the call that the men were missing, according to Jonathan Hanks, a battalion chief of the Shelby County Fire Department.

The three men ranged in age from their 20s to 50s, Hanks said. The investigation into their deaths is continuing, and the cause will be determined by the medical examiner, police said.

The stretch of the Mississippi River where the men disappeared, about 13 miles north of Memphis, has become a popular area at the state park in Shelby Forest, according to Brent W. Perkins, a Fire Department spokesperson. But there are eddies — currents that flow in a circular upstream direction — that can “pull an Olympic swimmer under,” Perkins said.

The barges that travel up and down the Mississippi are the size of a skyscraper placed on its side, he said, and there are also submerged items, branches, debris and other hazards that people in the water can become entangled in. He implored people to avoid wading into the river.

“These places are not conducive to survival,” Perkins said. “Once you get into that water, you cannot get out of the Mississippi. It will take you.”

Several agencies helped with the search for the men, including the sheriff’s office’s search and rescue team, the county dive team, the Fire Department, the U.S. Coast Guard and the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency, police said.

The sheriff’s office and the neighboring Tipton County Fire Department used advanced sonar technology to search the area, and the Memphis Police Department used thermal imaging cameras to search the air and water for a heat signature, Hanks said.

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Hannah Ziegler
c. 2025 The New York Times Company