The Sûreté du Québec (SQ) has confirmed that the body of a man was pulled out of the water at Pointe-des-Cascades early Sunday afternoon.
Police had been searching for a 37-year-old man who went missing while swimming in the locks of the Soulanges Canal in the town of Pointe-des-Cascades Saturday evening.
“We have to wait for a formal identification, but everything leads us to believe he is the missing swimmer,” SQ spokesperson Daniel Thibodeau, told Global News.
According to Thibodeau, the man was swimming with a friend, when he failed to surface.
The SQ was alerted at around 6:30 p.m. Saturday.
Rescuers with the Pointe-des-Cascades fire department, as well as the Coast Guard, were dispatched to search for the missing swimmer.
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Crews combed the shores for several hours until the search was called off at 9:30 p.m., Thibodeau said.
On Sunday morning, SQ divers joined the search. The body of the man was recovered at around 1 p.m. Sunday.
The Soulanges Canal is an abandoned shipping lane on the north shore of the St. Lawrence River, located between Pointe-des-Cascades and Coteaux Landing.
Despite a ban on swimming in the area, Thibodeau said the water is accessible from several locations in the park and people often do go in the water.
While drownings in the province have been on the decrease, Raynald Hawkins, executive director of the Quebec Lifesaving Society, said that water levels — which are particularly high this year due to floodwaters — lead to increased water flow and present greater risks for swimmers.
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Hawkins also said that if an area is not marked for swimming, people should only use watercrafts to access the water, and that a personal flotation device should be used at all times.
As of Saturday, there have been 29 deaths by drowning in Quebec since the beginning of the year, but Sunday’s discovery could bring the tally to 30. There were 28 drowning death by the same date in 2016.
— With files from The Canadian Press