Wardens recover body of final missing boater

7 years ago

A Maine Game Warden captured an image of a rainbow over Square Lake on Sunday, June 26, capping an 11 day recovery effort. (Courtesy of Maine Warden Service)

SQUARE LAKE TOWNSHIP, Maine — The search is over for the bodies of three men who died after their boat capsized on Square Lake nearly two weeks ago. The Maine Warden Service dive team recovered the body of Mark Chambers on Sunday evening at 5:50 p.m.

Chambers, 51, was one of four men whose boat capsized in 4- to 5-foot swells during a fishing expedition on Square Lake on June 13.

Mark Chambers, his brother Martin Chambers, 56, Eric Sherwood, 43, and Charles Guimond, 23, were tossed into Square Lake when their 12-foot motorboat capsized as high winds picked up shortly after they left the Chambers’ camp at about 3:30 p.m. on June 13. The men had been heading out to fish the thoroughfare between Square Lake and Eagle Lake when the accident happened.

Sherwood’s girlfriend notified the Maine Warden Service at about 2 a.m. on June 14 after the four men failed to return to the camp.

All four men clung to the boat until dark, according to wardens, but Guimond, who was the only one wearing a lifejacket, was able to hang on until it drifted to shore, where a searcher in a warden plane spotted him at about 5 a.m. on June 14.

The dive team found Mark Chambers in 48 feet of water about one-half mile south of where they found Sherwood’s body on June 23. Warden Service Pilot Gary Dumond spotted the body of Martin Chambers in shallow waters on the lake’s southeastern shore on June 14.

Square Lake is part of the Fish River chain of lakes and sits between Eagle and Cross lakes.

Wardens used side scan sonar to search 1,400 acres in an area one mile wide and 2.5 miles long. Lake depths within the search area fluctuate between 20 and 90 feet deep.