LAKE HALLIE, Wis. (AP) - A pontoon-like boat carrying six people celebrating an upcoming wedding collided with a speedboat along a western Wisconsin river, leaving two people dead and two others missing, officials said Saturday.
Both boats were traveling at speeds of more than 20 mph at the time of the Friday night crash that spun the speedboat and sent it washing ashore upstream along the Chippewa River, authorities said.
"It was a glancing, head-on (crash)," said John Andersen, chief of inspection for the Chippewa Fire District.
The driver of the larger boat, a flat-bed pontoon-like Princecraft, was arrested after the crash, said Chippewa County Undersheriff Eugene Gutsch. Alcohol use is part of the crash investigation, he said.
Six people in a wedding-related celebration were aboard the Princecraft boat; two people were on the speedboat.
A 27-year-old man on the Princecraft died along with a 50-year-old man on the speedboat. A woman on the speedboat and two people on the Princecraft were taken to local hospitals. Gutsch said three others on the Princecraft were able to swim to shore.
Crews continued to search for two missing men, ages 25 and 28, on Saturday. The efforts were complicated by a morning thunderstorm, fast river current, debris and other river traffic, The Chippewa Herald reported.
Andersen said none of the boaters was wearing life jackets at the time of the crash.