Body of missing boater recovered from Tennessee River, TWRA says

Brinley Hineman
Nashville Tennessean

The Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency announced on Facebook Tuesday night a body has been recovered from the Tennessee River during a search for three missing boaters. 

Search crews recovered the unidentified body around 4:30 p.m. Monday near Shiloh National Military Park on the Tennessee River. The body has been sent to the medical examiner's office in Memphis for an autopsy and to be identified. 

The discovery comes more than two weeks after Kenneth Driver and two 15-year-old boys went missing during a fishing competition on Pickwick Lake, which is formed by a dam on the river.

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A TWRA spokesperson said that the body was one of the three boaters, who have been missing since Feb. 22. 

Their boat was previously recovered downriver from the Pickwick Dam, having suffered "extensive damage" after it went through the floodgates.

The Facebook post says search crews have conducted extensive surface and sonar scans over the last 17 days to locate the missing boaters, who were last seen in a photo taken above the dam. 

Rescuers have concentrated their search efforts on a 14-mile stretch of the Tennessee River. 

Reach Brinley Hineman at bhineman@gannett.com, at 615-278-5164 and on Twitter @brinleyhineman.