UPDATE: Search for boy becomes recovery mission

Longboat Key Fire Rescue and other emergency crews are still searching for a six-year-old boy that got caught up in a current Saturday night in Longboat Pass. At this point, though, Longboat Key Police Chief Pete Cumming calls the search “a recovery mission with no realistic means of saving a life.”

Cumming has two officers searching the waters in the police boat this morning and is taking direction from the U.S. Coast Guard and Bradenton Beach emergency crews.

Lamontea Taylor, 6, was playing in the water with three cousins around 6:30 p.m. Saturday, April 20 near the south end of Coquina Beach on Anna Maria Island when he got swept into a current in the pass, according to a press release. The area where the boys were swimming had ‘No Swimming’ signs posted and family members said they thought the children were somewhere else at the time of the incident.

Rescue crews were able to save the three cousins, but couldn’t locate Taylor.

Fire and police crews from Longboat Key, the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office and the U.S. Coast Guard searched for Taylor until almost 11 p.m. Saturday before resuming the search at daybreak on Sunday.

The current search area is from Bradenton Beach on Anna Maria Island to Whitney Beach on Longboat Key, both in the Gulf and in the Intracoastal Waterway.

For updates, check www.yourobserver.com and pick up a copy of Thursday’s Sunday, April 21 Longboat Observer.

Contact Kurt Schultheis at [email protected].