Overview
- Divers from a specialist Munich firm recovered the body of a 23-year-old student in the Starnberger Bucht months after he went missing during a boat trip.
- Police say the man, who could not swim, repeatedly jumped from the motorboat and then clung to two friends so tightly that they could not lift him back aboard.
- Initial rescue teams including the Wasserwacht and the Wasserschutzpolizei Starnberg used drones, search dogs and a sonar boat but failed to find him at the time.
- Earlier on the same day a separate drowning occurred near the Percha bathing bay when a 32-year-old man was pulled from the water unconscious and died despite resuscitation; his partner and five children were cared for by a crisis team and the Kriminalpolizei Fürstenfeldbruck opened an investigation.
- The delayed recovery underscores how panic by non-swimmers can endanger bystanders and how lake searches sometimes need specialist divers, a point that may prompt calls for more training and clearer safety rules for recreational boaters and swimmers.