SELINSGROVE — Vladyslav Mitrenko was a fit 19-year-old looking for a physical challenge Sunday night when he got into a canoe on the Susquehanna River with his older brother and two friends and paddled north toward a dam near the Sunbury Generation power plant.
The trip ended in tragedy around 6 p.m. when the current near the dam caused the canoe to overturn, spilling Mitrenko, his brother, Alexander, 24, of Philadelphia, Daniel Dicola, 23, of Shamokin Dam, and Devon Van Horn, 25, of Selinsgrove, into the river.
Alexander, Dicola and Van Horn swam to safety, but Mitrenko was pulled under the water and drowned. His body was recovered Tuesday at about 7:30 a.m.
Northumberland County Coroner James F. Kelley attributed the accidental death to drowning.
“Alex is not talking, it’s just been too much. He saw his brother go down for the last time,” said George Kinney, of Selinsgrove. “It is such a tragedy.”
Mitrenko, a native of the Ukraine who’s been in the U.S. since late May on a work visa, was living with Kinney and working at Rowe Line Construction in Sunbury for the summer.
Alex Mitrenko had lived with Kinney while attending Susquehanna University several years ago. For the past two years he’s been in the U.S. on a work visa while working at Prudential in Philadelphia.
When his younger brother obtained a temporary visa to work in the U.S. to pay for college back home, Alex suggested he stay with Kinney.
“Vlad was a sweet, lovable kid,” Kinney said, describing the teen who was studying management and tourism in his homeland.
For the past nine years, Kinney has hosted 12 foreign exchange students attending Selinsgrove High School and is preparing for two more student arrivals later this month.
“I always dreaded that something like this would happen,” said Kinney, who was in Canada when the accident happened.
On Tuesday afternoon, Alexander and Dicola were grieving together at Kinney’s home. Neither wanted to speak publicly about the accident.
The young men told Kinney what happened Sunday night.
The group, all of whom had been on the river before, got into the canoe and purposefully headed toward the dam in Shamokin Dam.
“There were (warning) signs, but they said it looked so innocent,” Kinney said.
As they paddled toward the dam, the three men and one woman turned the boat to the bank with the intent of pushing off and turning in the other direction.
“The back end of the canoe just got pulled in by the churning current,” Kinney said.
All four were dumped in the water. Dicola, who along with Mitrenko was wearing a life vest, said the pressure of the current was so strong it tore the vest off of him, Kinney said.
The three survivors swam to a fisherman’s boat, where they were rescued. Mitrenko was swept away into the current.
“Alex was trying to help his brother, but the current was too swift,” he said. “The amazing thing is that three of them survived.”
Clay Rowe, vice president of Rowe Line Construction where Mitrenko worked since early June, said the young man everyone at the company knew as “Ross” was a lively, outgoing person who made a big impact in the short time he was there working in traffic control.
“He just had a super personality. He would have been a success at whatever he would have pursued,” Rowe said. “All of us here feel a tremendous loss.”
Rowe said he was surprised to learn the 6-foot-tall young man was unable to swim to safety.
“He seemed like he was in very good shape,” he said, describing his hands as calloused even though he didn’t perform manual labor at the company.
Kinney said Alex, who notified his parents in the Ukraine about the accident by telephone, hasn’t spoken much about his only sibling’s death.
“They fought like brothers, but they were very, very close,” he said. “I just want to get him through this stage. He’s having a very difficult time.”
Adding to his grief are the arrangements that need to be made to take Mitrenko’s body home.
The coroner’s office is assisting in the effort, but Kinney said Alex is also having to deal with the possibility that since he’s in the U.S. on a work visa he may not be able to return here if he leaves for his brother’s funeral.
“The lawyers are working on it,” he said.
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