17-year-old boy drowns after kayak overturns in Barron County

Authorities say a 17-year-old boy from Minnesota died of an apparent drowning over the weekend after his kayak tipped over on a western Wisconsin lake.

According to the Barron County Sheriff’s Office, dispatch received multiple reports of people screaming for help on Kirby Lake in Maple Plain Township around 12:35 p.m. Saturday. Two people were in the water because their kayaks had overturned, and 17-year-old Emiliano Alonzo Linaldi Enriquez had not resurfaced.

Several rescue agencies searched the lake, and sonar captured Linaldi Enriquez under the water, the sheriff’s office said. Divers from the Chetek Fire Department went into the water and brought the boy back to the surface. He was airlifted to a hospital in Minnesota, but he did not survive.

The Barron County Sheriff’s Office and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources are investigating the incident.