72-year-old wakeboarder dies after rope drags him into boat propeller, deputies say

PORTLAND, Ore. (KPTV/Gray News) – A 72-year-old man in Oregon is dead after a wakeboarding accident over the weekend.

According to the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office, the accident happened on Sunday morning in the Columbia River near the west end of Government Island.

Authorities said emergency responders received a 911 call about a person who had been injured by a boat propeller at about 11 a.m

Fire and rescue crews said the man was already dead when they arrived.

Witnesses told deputies that at some point while the man was wakeboarding a tow rope became tangled with the boat’s propeller that dragged him underneath the boat.

The sheriff’s office said he suffered a traumatic injury to his head while being trapped under the boat for about five minutes.

People at the scene were able to pull his body from the water before the first responders pronounced him dead.

Authorities did not immediately identify the wakeboarder killed. The medical examiner’s office is determining the man’s official cause of his death.

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