More human remains found at Lake Mead

Authorities were working to identify partial human remains found by a bystander at a Lake Mead National Recreation Area beach.

The National Park Service said rangers responded about 4:30 p.m. Monday to a report of remains spotted at Swim Beach, a small recreation area along the Boulder Basin of Lake Mead.

The Clark County coroner’s office is expected to identify the body and determine the person’s cause of death, officials said.

Coroner Melanie Rouse said Tuesday it was partially encased in mud at the water line of the swimming area along the shore north of Hemenway Harbor marina.

Coroner’s office staff conducted an initial examination Tuesday, according to Rouse, who did not comment on the state of the remains, but noted that they belonged to a single person.

The gender of the dead person was not immediately apparent, Rouse said. Investigators will review missing persons records as part of the effort.

The corpse was the third found since May at the shoreline retreats at the shrinking reservoir. The lake surface has dropped more than 170 feet since the reservoir was full in 1983. It is now about 30 percent full.

“As water levels recede and fluctuate, it is possible that artifacts that we do and don’t know about may emerge; including human remains from previous missing person reports,” the park service wrote in a statement, noting that there were no updates on Monday’s discovery. “When Lake Mead was at its highest elevations in the mid-80s through early 90s, recovery efforts may have been unsuccessful due to diving depth limitations for search and rescue teams. However, lowering water levels may help to answer old missing person cases and give families some closure.”

Recently, a once-sunken World War II-era landing craft began to re-emerge from the water less than a mile from Lake Mead Marina and Hemeway Harbor, and NASA satellite images released this month showed the stark difference in current water levels compared to 2000.

The coroner said her office also was continuing work to identify a man whose body was found May 1 in a rusted barrel in the Hemenway Harbor area and a man whose bones were found May 7 in a newly surfaced sand bar near Callville Bay, more than 9 miles from the marina.

On July 6, the body of a 22-year-old Boulder City woman was found in the water near where she disappeared while riding a personal watercraft. Rouse said it may take several weeks to determine her cause of death.

The case of the body in the barrel was being investigated as a homicide after police said the man had been shot and his clothing dated to the mid-1970s to early 1980s.

The discoveries have prompted speculation about long-unsolved missing person and murder cases dating back decades — to organized crime and the early days of Las Vegas.

“Despite newfound public curiosity, and contrary to offers of financial reward, visitors are not permitted to come to the park to independently search for potential human remains,” the statement from the park service said.

Visitors who come across human remains should not disturb the area.

“They should do as the most recent park visitor did: call Park Dispatch and provide Rangers with their approximate location so we can reach the scene promptly to set a perimeter and begin the investigation,” the park service said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Contact Ricardo Torres-Cortez at rtorres@reviewjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @rickytwrites.