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Hawaii island rescue personnel will continue a search for a missing swimmer in Hilo on Friday and were looking for a missing diver off North Kohala on Thursday night.
A Coast Guard cutter and helicopter were to work through the night Thursday and into Friday morning searching for the free-diver in his 50s, who was diving with two friends. He was last seen at 10:30 p.m. Wednesday wearing a black wet suit off North Kohala at the end of Old Coast Guard Road.
A Coast Guard MH-65 Dolphin helicopter crew found a submerged dive light. Hawaii Fire Department divers have since recovered the light and a three-pronged fishing spear belonging to the diver, the Coast Guard said.
The search Thursday involved the Coast Guard cutter Ahi and Hawaii Fire Department dive teams, rescue boat and helicopter. An HC-130 Hercules crew from Barbers Point joined the search.
The Fire Department will continue searching Hilo Bay at first light Friday for the missing 62-year-old Kona woman who was swept away by fast-moving waters of the Wailuku River in an area known as Boiling Pots.
The Fire Department’s ground teams and helicopter searched the river and river banks Thursday as they did Wednesday.
Capt. Charles Spain of the Waiakea Fire Station said divers dived into the lower ponds and searched there but were unable to dive in the suspected area (upper pond) where the woman was last seen because it is “still a little rough today.” The rescue swimmers searched until nightfall and did not find any signs of the victim Thursday.
Jolee Reiswig was last seen at 5:30 p.m. Monday. She was floating on an inflatable tube, fell off and could not get back to the river bank, the Fire Department said.
On Tuesday the woman’s swim tube and noodle were recovered.
Reiswig runs a bed-and-breakfast and offers waterfall hikes and other water adventures.
Reiswig was with a male customer at the time she was swept away. He made it back to the river bank.