Drownings rise with floodwaters in Missouri as troopers caution safety on Labor Day weekend

John Lyons saw the water flooding over the road and stopped his car.

Every day, he crossed this dip in the road over Hamilton Creek on his way to work, driving through Meramec State Park west of St. Louis on his way to the tool and die shop. Lyons was 60 and at home in the outdoors. He knew the dangers of water.

But on this morning, he watched a truck ahead of him pass through the rising water with no trouble. Lyons pressed ahead. He didn’t make it.

Lyons is one of 48 people who have drowned in the outdoors in Missouri so far in 2015, making this year one of the worst in recent memory for deaths in the water. Many died in swimming accidents in lakes, rivers and streams, but a rash of flash flooding added to the danger, according to the Missouri State Highway Patrol.

“This year, we’ve really been hit statewide,” said patrol Capt. John Hotz. “People make the mistake of driving through areas where there is fast-moving water across the roadway. I just don’t think people understand the destructive power of water. Six inches of water moving rapidly over the road can sweep a vehicle away.”

The summer is peak season for drownings, and with Labor Day weekend attracting crowds to the Lake of the Ozarks and other state waterways, the patrol urged people to take well-known safety precautions. Troopers said anyone near the water should have a life jacket and warned drivers not to try to cross a flooded road, even if the water looks shallow.

Missouri has already seen more drownings in 2015 than it usually has in a year. In July, the count rose above last year’s mark of 29 and is close to matching the 50 recorded in 2010, the worst in nearly a decade. The patrol’s reports did not include swimming pools or accidents at home.

In Missouri, the floodwaters don’t account for all of the year’s losses but added to the toll. At least seven of the 48 people who drowned in the outdoors in Missouri were found in flooded areas in Henry, Washington, Cooper, Jefferson, Lincoln and Lewis counties.

Kansas, with its dry expanses, sees fewer drowning cases. In 2013, the most recent year data were available, accidents claimed 26 people in lakes, rivers and streams. Last weekend, a 30-year-old Bonner Springs man jumped into the water at Perry Lake’s Party Cove and never resurfaced.

“It’s a big deal,” said Linda Lanterman, Kansas State Parks director. “We’ve had bad years. Sometimes that flows from the amount of rainwater. One year we had 17 in a short period of time, and it was devastating for us.”

Lyons’ death June 16 was particularly cruel, his family said, because the machinist had just lost a 38-year-old stepson the month before to a head-on collision with another motorist, who was also killed.

Lyons’ wife, Nancy, was left at the family’s rural home outside Sullivan, Mo., trying to pay for two funerals. Her brother Steve Grimmer and his wife, Brenda, stepped in from St. Louis to help.

“It’s been hard,” Brenda Grimmer said. “The family has had a difficult time.”

The Lyons and Grimmer families had been taking canoe trips together for years, floating 13 rivers around the state. They had close calls before, on one night waking up in their riverside camp to find the water rising quickly around them.

They hurriedly threw belongings into their vehicles and fled. “It came up that fast,” Brenda Grimmer said. “Nothing to mess with.”

In John Lyons, they lost the drummer in a family band formed in the 1970s that included wife Nancy on bass, Steve Grimmer on guitar and Brenda Grimmer singing. Just the weekend before John Lyons’ accident, the family had gotten together, camping in the woods near Sullivan and playing music. Their plans to canoe the Meramec River were canceled because the water was too high, but they had fun anyway.

It reminded Steve Grimmer of the old days, when he and Lyons wrote progressive rock songs together and their band performed as Herald Head. They once played at the now-closed Mississippi Nights rock club on the St. Louis waterfront.

“That was a good memory,” Steve Grimmer said. “It was a really good time.” No one imagined Lyons would run into such trouble on the way to work in the morning. “It’s something you don’t expect.”

Witnesses told the family that Lyons hesitated before trying to drive through the water. Normally he drove his truck, but on this day he was driving his daughter’s 1992 Lexus. It halted in the water, which rose fast around the car and pushed it off the side of the road. The car flipped, trapping Lyons.

The Highway Patrol advised people to avoid taking any chances and cautioned that water can be deceiving. Motorists who find their vehicles stuck in the water should get out and move to higher ground.

The majority of water deaths come from swimming mishaps and accidents involving boats, canoes and kayaks. Some are dramatic. Some remain unexplained.

For example, two swimmers at the Lake of the Ozarks in June sensed electricity in the water, according to a Highway Patrol report. One of them, a 21-year-old man from East Moline, Ill., grabbed the metal ladder on a boat and was struck dead. The case is still under investigation.

In Joplin, a 50-year-old man last month waded into a drainage ditch to rescue his son and another child who were playing in the water and nearly were carried away. The man saved the children, but he was swept under and died.

Those were exceptional cases. Many others could be prevented. Several people this year fell off of docks or overboard from boats and died in the water.

Drowning deaths typically peak in the summer, and Labor Day brings many possible accidents, the patrol said. Anyone near the water should wear a life jacket, or at least have one within reach.

This story was originally published September 4, 2015 at 6:41 PM with the headline "Drownings rise with floodwaters in Missouri as troopers caution safety on Labor Day weekend."