Man drowns off south beach in calm Lake Michigan

A 71-year-old Mequon man who was relaxing on a calm Lake Michigan last Wednesday slipped below the surface of the water about 3:25 p.m.

Alan Ash had been on an inner tube with a seat, but got off and couldn’t get back onto the floatation device, Port Washington Police Captain Craig Czarnecki said.

“He just didn’t get back up,” Czarnecki said. “I don’t know if he just got pooped out or what.”

Ash’s wife saw him from shore, he said, but she was a distance away. 

Bystanders pulled Ash from the water, and a nurse and medical student began CPR, Czarnecki said, adding Ash did not have a pulse or heart rhythm. 

Police officers and fire and ambulance crews took over for them, and Ash was transported to Aurora Medical Center in Grafton.

Ash died early the next morning at the hospital of complications from a near drowning, Czarnecki said.

A number of people on shore witnessed the accident, he said, and it is estimated Ash was underwater for about five minutes.

Czarnecki called the incident a tragedy, noting weather and conditions didn’t indicate any sort of issues.  

“It’s a sad and tragic thing,” he said. “There wasn’t bad weather. The lake was like glass. There weren’t rip currents. ”