RedactedNarrative: On 8/7/16 at approximately 2151 hours, AST received a report from JBER Fire Department about a raft that flipped on Eagle River, causing the two passengers on board to fall in. One of the passengers was rescued shortly after by JBER Fire Dept.  The other male, who was identified as the brother, was seen floating down river toward the Inlet. JBER Fire Dept. sent their raft down river to attempt to locate Victim, but was unsuccessful. RCC was contacted and sent a helicopter to search the area.
  
  On 8/8/16 at approximately 0213 hours, RCC recovered Victim from the Cook Inlet and transported him to Providence Medical Center where he was pronounced deceased. Waynesboro PD was contacted and requested to do a next of kin notification to Victim’s mother.
  
  On 08/09/2016 at approximately 0735 hours, Inv. went to the autopsy of Victim (SME Case number 16-01145) with pathologist Dr.. Victim’s organs and some of his tissues had been already been harvested prior to the autopsy. Dr. did an external exam. He advised there were few clothes left to exam at autopsy. One of the sandals had the tread ripping off. The PFD that was present was missing the back panel. There was a “failure” of the nylon along the back side and the rear flotation panel was missing. Dr. determined the cause of death to be drowning. The manner of death was classified as accidental.
  
  I contacted Brother and asked him about what happened. He advised Victim had been asking him all summer to take him kayaking. He stated he owned an "industrial" grade raft and thought they could just take that out. He stated he had rented some life jackets from a place on base, and that his sister was supposed to go with them, but decided the last minute not to. Their plan was to go from Bailey Bridge to Bravo Bridge on Eagle River. 
  
  He said the weather was warm, but the water was cold. He stated the water was somewhat rough, but not any rougher than what he has been on in Pennsylvania. They started around 1800 hours to 1830 hours. They got about halfway through when they hit a dead fall tree that was in the river. 
  
  The raft then flipped and they both fell out. Brother said he had told Victim if they fell in the river to either hold onto the raft if he could, or hold on to his PFD and float down river until he could reach shore. He stated they were floating down river on opposite sides of the river from one another. After floating approximately 1 mile down river, Brother advised Victim appeared to grab onto another dead fall tree that was in the river. He said Victim appeared cold, and when he yelled to Victim, Victim appeared to acknowledge hearing him. Brother said it was the last time he saw Victim. 
  
  When he was finally able to reach shore, he ran back up river, approximately 10 minutes, to where he last saw Victim, but he was not there. At that time Emergency Services had located Brother and took him down to Bravo Bridge where Brother's wife had been waiting for them and had called 911 when she saw the raft float by. He stated they told him they had seen Victim float by with just his head above water, and appeared unresponsive.