INDEX — A week after Kevin Dang drowned, Sky Valley Fire Chief Eric Andrews went back to Eagle Falls.
Another swimmer needed to be rescued.
In the past five years, a dozen people have now drowned here, according to police and fire officials. The roaring dark blue waterfalls are flanked by smooth rock slabs and overhanging evergreens that block the sound of passing cars.
Andrews returned again to the falls on a warm Tuesday in late June, to talk with families picnicking with children. Loud pop music battled with the rushing of the falls. Young people drank White Claws and tequila. One by one, Andrews made his way to everyone, asking if they saw all three signs warning them not to go in the water
“It’s very deceiving,” said Andrews, a firefighter for 49 years. “It’s very easy to swim across. It’s just the cold water shock.”
Eagle Falls’ beauty has enticed swimmers every summer for decades. In 2020, the falls went viral on TikTok. In dreamy videos that look straight out of a movie, teenagers jump from rope swings and splash in the sparkling water. People from all over the state made their way to the stretch of the Skykomish River, about 4 miles east of Index alongside Highway 2.
With the popularity came drowning after drowning.
Last month, tragedy struck again, this time a 19-year-old student at the University of Washington. Dang and a friend drove to Eagle Falls on June 12. They both jumped in and swam toward the other side. Dang’s friend had just made it across when he turned around and noticed his friend struggling. Dang’s leg was cramping in the cold water. The friend swam back to him, but Dang “just sunk like a rock and disappeared,” Andrews said.
His friend searched for him, with no luck, then called 911. A rescue swimmer located Dang’s body 50 feet from where he sank. Sky Valley Fire tried to revive him for 20 minutes, but he died at the scene.
Dang had just finished his freshman year on a prelaw track, set to graduate a year early, according to his LinkedIn. Family and friends did not respond to a reporter’s requests.
“Most people that die here, they know how to swim. They’re really good swimmers,” Andrews said to a mom and her 9-year-old-kid about to jump in the water. “I realized it doesn’t matter how good of a swimmer you are.”
“Never safe”
Devin Shelby was a good swimmer, his mother Shawtue Shelby said. He drowned at Eagle Falls in the summer of 2020. Swept under the current, his body was never recovered.
Her son loved the outdoors. He was always traveling to lakes and waterfalls throughout the state. Devin Shelby saw Eagle Falls on social media and showed his mother a video of kids jumping off a rope tied up to a branch. He went to Eagle Falls two times, before the last time.
The sudden loss “was very surreal. I knew this had to be somebody else’s son. It can’t be my son,” Shawtue Shelby said. “It wasn’t piecing together.”
It was a time when stay-at-home orders told people to keep 6 feet apart indoors.
Amid the cabin fever, the number of people visiting Eagle Falls tripled — as did the number of people who needed rescuing, said Greg Sanders, search and rescue sergeant with the Snohomish County sheriff’s office.
“Every time I hear ‘Eagle Falls,’ my blood pressure goes up,” Sanders said.
When people jump in, cold water shocks the system, Sanders said. Arms and legs shut down. And the falls have a deceptive undertow.
In the late summer, when the water is warmer and the river runs lower, the fire station receives fewer calls.
“Some locals would argue that it’s safe at that time. Some say it’s never safe,” Andrews said.
One 18-year-old man from Startup drowned at Eagle Falls on April 6, 2020 — well before the summer heat rolled in, with the high that day being 56 degrees.
In the summer of 2020, Sanders was called to Eagle Falls for five rescue efforts.
Peter Sei, 32, of Seattle, was one of the victims. The father of five drowned on June 23. After Sei drowned, Sanders went to Eagle Falls to pass out life jackets to people, especially to parents.
“The last thing I want to do is pull young children out of there,” Sanders said. “I hate it.”
A month later, another person was airlifted after a near-drowning in the falls. Sixteen people were stranded on the other side, not willing to swim back over after watching. One was a parent with a toddler.
“Then they realized, ‘Oh my God, I just watched someone drown. We’re not moving till we get rescued,’ which was probably the right move on their part,” Sanders said. “But maybe you shouldn’t have gone over there in the first place.”
Ten days later, Devin Shelby drowned.
Shawtue Shelby and her family drove from Tacoma to Eagle Falls, about 85 miles, again and again for about year. Dogs and volunteers kept looking for his remains. She kept in close touch with Sanders, who said he went diving 25 times trying to find Devin Shelby.
Sanders said it was infuriating to not find the young man’s body because “that’s what our job is.” He recalled Devin Shelby’s dad yelling at him: “Don’t die trying to save my son!”
Shawtue Shelby felt “incomplete” after her son’s death. Because his body was never found, she never got closure.
“He was listed as a missing person, and I have to go through all of these hoops now to get a death certificate after five years,” Shawtue Shelby said. “I had to take leave from work and go to counseling, the whole nine yards.”
“The next person”
Persistent drownings have led some locals to call for Eagle Falls to be closed off.
The U.S. Forest Service oversees that stretch of the Skykomish River, but does not intend to fence off the area or ban swimming. A spokesperson with the Forest Service’s national press team said over email: “There would be no means of enforcement due to its ease of access from Highway 2.” Instead, the Forest Service has worked with Sky Valley Fire to hang warning signs, and hopes to “encourage the public to recreate responsibly.”
“Unfortunately, accidental drownings do occur at other locations (in the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest) each year,” said the spokesperson, who did not provide a name. “Eagle Falls is one location that has a high likelihood of these tragic events due to the total visitation that is seen in the area.”
Andrews’ crews have recovered bodies from other popular Skykomish Valley waterfalls: Sunset Falls, Bridal Veil Falls, Wallace Falls and Canyon Falls.
None has seen as many deaths as Eagle Falls, where a common theme has emerged among the victims. They tend to be young men from outside the Skykomish Valley.
In March 2024, two men from Japan drowned. Andrews said the pair, age 21 and 34, didn’t even plan on swimming, but one slipped into the water and the other went in after him.
The last to drown before this year was a 24-year-old man from Covington, found unresponsive in the water July 4. He died a day later at a hospital.
Beth Ebel, a professor of pediatrics at the University of Washington, said cold water shock is common in the state because rivers course with water directly from melting snowpack. That water is almost the same temperature as glacial ice.
“Even strong swimmers in that cold temperature, (with) those swift currents and the turbulence in the eddies, they can drown in those waters,” Ebel said.
Andrews believes people will swim regardless of the warnings. The local fire station encourages people to use life jackets, offering them for free.
Mario Silva, 30, of Redmond, saw the three giant banners warning of the danger. He still decided to go in. Silva, wearing a wet suit and a lifejacket, made it halfway across before he called out for his friend to help him make it back. He sat beside the falls, shivering.
“It was a little scary,” Silva said. “I was just surprised I could do it.”
Andrews said Silva and his friend were the only people he’s seen at Eagle Falls wearing life jackets.
Heather Falkin, a mother with two teenagers in the water, said her kids are competitive swimmers. They’ve been coming to Eagle Falls for years, and the kids never had an issue with the water.
“I guess you got to be really comfortable in cold water,” she said.
Nearby was a small memorial with flowers for Dang.
A family of three, visiting from the suburbs of Chicago, stopped to ask Andrews what the signs mean. The mother dropped her jaw when she heard how many young men have died here, before looking to her own son.
“I just wonder who’s the next person,” Andrews said. “The last people that died here also knew it was fun.”
