The National Park Service responded to a report of “potential human remains” within Lake Mead National Recreation Area on Sunday, a spokesperson wrote in an email to the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
Both park rangers and the Metropolitan Police Department responded to Boulder Beach, a public shoreline about seven miles from downtown Boulder City. The incident remains under investigation, the spokesperson said, and no other information was available to release as of Monday morning.
This month, Lake Mead reached its lowest level on record since it was filled in the 1930s, and federal forecasters project that it will continue to set new records over the next two years. The reservoir’s combined storage with Lake Powell hasn’t been this low since 1957, according to a July study.
That’s partially because of the poorest runoff season on record for the Colorado River Basin this year, to the tune of 13 percent of normal runoff into Lake Powell. Such a meager snow year prompted the Bureau of Reclamation, the federal agency that manages dams and water in the West, to reduce flows into Lake Mead to protect infrastructure at Lake Powell.
Lake Mead has long been thought to have human remains in its waters, something that became evident in 2022 when lake levels began to recede. The national recreation area regularly tops the annual list of deadliest sites managed by the park service, and the Review-Journal reported in 2022 that between 1937 and 1994, about 59 people were listed as missing or presumed drowned within the park boundary.
In 2022, a string of human remains turned up at Lake Mead, including those of 52-year-old Las Vegas fisherman Claude Pensinger, who officials said had disappeared in 1998.
The Clark County coroner’s office never officially identified one man’s remains from a homicide that appeared at Hemenway Harbor in 2022, though some have looked for clues by analyzing his clothing.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
Contact Alan Halaly at ahalaly@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AlanHalaly on X.
