Rescue teams search for missing tourist in Jacó waters

Update, Monday, 11:13 a.m.: The Tico Times attempted to clarify with the Red Cross the details of the “accident at sea,” and the Red Cross responded by saying only that they had received a report at 7:31 p.m. of “two people disappeared, possibly due to strong waves.” We will update this story as more information becomes available. 

Original post continues here:

A North American tourist involved in an accident at sea at Jacó Beach, on Costa Rica’s Central Pacific coast, has gone missing, according to Red Cross Spokesman Freddy Román.

The National Air Vigilance Service, the Coast Guard and the Red Cross launched a rescue operation by air, sea and land to find the missing man, who is approximately 30 years old. Rescue workers are using a speedboat and a jetski to perform the search at sea.

The tourist was involved in an accident on Saturday with another North American man, who is approximately 26 years old and was rescued yesterday and urgently transported to a medical center, Román stated.

The University of  Costa Rica’s Ocean Sciences and Limnology Research Center had warned that there would be strong waves this weekend, mostly in the northern Pacific Guanacaste area, with conditions worsening next week in the country’s Central and South Pacific, in Puntarenas, the Caribbean coast, and even off Isla del Coco, in the Pacific Ocean, where navigation could be dangerous, the daily La Nación reported on Friday.

The body of another tourist who disappeared in Jacó waters, a 34-year-old man from Los Angeles, California, was found on May 15 two miles off the coast of the popular tourist destination.