STATE OF VERMONT

DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SAFETY

VERMONT STATE POLICE

Vermont State Police provides update on deaths in Seymour Lake in Morgan

MORGAN, Vermont (Friday, April 22, 2022) — The Vermont Chief Medical Examiner’s Office has completed autopsies on Aidan Connolly and Nicholas Samuels, the Massachusetts men who died Tuesday in Seymour Lake in Morgan. The preliminary determination of the cause of both deaths was drowning and cold-water immersion, and the manner of the deaths was accidental.

***Update No. 1, 9:10 p.m. Tuesday, April 19, 2022***

Early this evening, members of the Vermont State Police SCUBA Team recovered the bodies of two drowning victims from Seymour Lake in the town of Morgan.

The victims are identified as Aidan Connolly, 27, of Roslindale, Massachusetts, and Nicholas Samuels, 29, of Weston, Massachusetts.

Their bodies were found about 100 yards from shore and will be transported to the Chief Medical Examiner’s Office in Burlington for autopsies to confirm the cause and manner of death.

The weather at the time of the incident was cold with increasing rain and strong winds. The lake became choppy with significant waves, ice and slush. Investigation by VSP determined the victims set out in a single kayak from a protected cove where the conditions on the open lake were not apparent and worsened while they were on the water.

The Vermont State Police was assisted by the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles Enforcement & Safety Division, the Derby Line and Newport fire departments, Newport Ambulance, and the Orleans County Sheriff’s Department.

***Initial news release, 3:10 p.m. Tuesday, April 19, 2022***

The Vermont State Police is investigating a report that two people drowned late Tuesday morning, April 19, 2022, in Seymour Lake in the town of Morgan.

State police dispatch was notified at about 11:45 a.m. by a witness who reported seeing two men on the lake in a canoe that subsequently overturned. The men began trying to swim back to shore, but the witness reported seeing them go under the water and not resurface. First-responding agencies from the area were unable to locate the individuals.

Members of the Vermont State Police, including the SCUBA Team, and VSP’s airboats are responding to the scene for what is expected to be a recovery operation.

Anyone with information about this incident is asked to call the state police’s Derby Barracks at 802-334-8881.

No further information is currently available. The state police will provide updates as the situation unfolds.

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