Search for missing boy on Lake Lanier slowed by heavy traffic - Atlanta News, Weather, Traffic, and Sports | FOX 5

Technical problems with SONAR and heavy traffic on Lake Lanier limited the search for Griffin Prince on Sunday.

It has been six days now since the 13-year-old boy was last seen. A boat crash threw him into the water and killed his younger brother.

The high traffic on Lake Lanier this weekend made for a bumpy ride on the water. It also made the search for Prince all but futile.
 
"The heavy boat traffic is complicating the side scan sonar, because the ranger running that can not look at the computer screen because of the wave action. And that's the reason why we're not diving today, because of the heavy boat traffic," said Sgt. Lee Brown with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources.

On top of that, electronic search equipment problems prevented crews from doing much in-depth searching at all Sunday.

So, the full scale search for Griffin will begin again Monday morning, a week after the tragic accident. That was when investigators say a drunken boater slammed into the Prince family's pontoon boat, killing 9-year-old Jake Prince and sending 13-year-old Griffin into the water. He has not been seen since.

Several boaters tell FOX 5 News that the accident has made them rethink their own safety on the lake. And the heavy presence of Georgia Department of Natural Resources rangers has reinforced those thoughts.

A weekend long crackdown on drunk boating, scheduled in advance of last week's crash, has netted several arrests. The message they are giving boaters this weekend is that the lake and alcohol don't mix.