The game warden that found their bodies said that Craig Strickland and Chase Morland were doomed the instant they entered Kaw Lake on Dec. 27 for their fatal duck hunt.
Spencer Grace is the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation game warden serving Kay County. He was raised in that area and knows Kaw Lake, northwest of Tulsa near the Kansas border, well.
"I'm the only guy that might have found them alive," Grace said. "I knew where they would be given the wind direction. My hope was that they rode the boat to shore and used it for shelter."
Strickland and Morland were unprepared for the stormy, icy conditions they encountered on the windswept prairie reservoir that morning. Strickland had hunted Kaw Lake, an Arkansas River impoundment, once before, with a guide out of a boat at a place called Bird Island, in the northwest arm of the lake, Grace said. That's where he and Morland were headed when they disappeared.
Grace said the pair entered the lake in a 10-foot aluminum fishing boat that did not have a motor. They had only one kayak paddle to propel and steer the boat.
Crammed into this boat were two hunters weighing about 175 pounds each, a large Labrador retriever, four-dozen duck decoys, shotguns, ammo, other assorted gear and a 50-quart Yeti cooler that was half full of food and drinks, Grace said.
"I don't know what the weight rating is for that boat, but it couldn't be rated for more than 400 pounds," Grace said.
With that load, the boat had only 3 inches of freeboard, Grace said.
The lake was much higher than normal, so it was also a lot wider than normal. They entered the lake on the east bank. A 50-mph wind blew from the northeast, which would have pushed them west.
"It wasn't 50 mile-an-hour gusts," Grace said. "That was a sustained 50 mile-an-hour wind."
The icy, wind-driven rain created what Grace described as a "rain blizzard."
"The rain froze to whatever it touched," Grace said.
Somehow Strickland and Morland made it across the Arkansas River channel to a narrow strip of land, Grace said. They portaged about 15-20 yards and then paddled through a stretch of flooded timber.
Once they cleared the trees, they entered a wide expanse of open water where there was no windbreak. With the lake so high, the "island" that Strickland and Morland intended to hunt was about 8 feet under water, Grace said.
That's where the boat swamped or capsized.
Morland shed his neoprene waders, perhaps believing he could swim better without them, Grace said.
"He never made it out of the water," Grace said. "I found his waders about 500 yards up the bank from where I found his body."
Grace found Strickland's wader-clad body Jan. 4, on dry land.
"He either swam to shore or he rode that Yeti cooler and used the paddle to get to shore," Grace said.
The waders bought Strickland enough time to reach shore, but Grace said it was not possible for a person in waterlogged clothing to survive long in those conditions.
"Even with a lighter or matches, there's no way he could get a fire going in that weather," Grace said.
Cell phones belonging to the men were smashed and soaked, Grace said, so they would have been unable to summon help.
The pair's last known contact was Dec. 26, at 11:42 p.m., when Morland tweeted that he and Strickland were driving to Kaw Lake through a bad storm. Grace said he believes the accident occurred sometime around 2 a.m.
"I assume they capsized in the dark, and were probably dead before the sun came up," Grace said.
A bad end was certain when Strickland and Morland launched the boat, Grace said. Attempting to turn around would have plunged the bow of a seriously overloaded boat into the teeth of high, rolling waves with only a kayak paddle for power.
"In my opinion, once they leave that truck and go across that river channel, there's no way they return," Grace said. "There is no way for this to have had a different outcome."
Grace said Strickland's band, Backroad Anthem, was popular in northeast Oklahoma, and he wants to honor their memory with a monument at the spot where they entered the lake.
"I want to organize a Craig Strickland memorial hunt as a way to honor him and promote hunter safety," Grace said. "His death affected a lot of people around here."
Sports on 02/14/2016