Police recover the man swept off Marquette’s Black Rocks; the search is over

MARQUETTE — Police said Friday morning they recovered the body of the man witnesses saw swept off the Black Rocks at Presque Isle Park on Thursday afternoon.

WLUC, quoting a Friday press release from the Marquette Police Department, said Marquette police and the Chocolay Township Police Department were sent at about 8:22 a.m. on reports of a body in the water near Lakewood Lane in Harvey. Officers found the body just off the beach and recovered it. The department said it confirmed this was the same man who went into the lake at Black Rocks on Thursday.

The release, as WLUC printed it, described him as a 62-year-old man from Calumet. CBS Detroit, earlier Friday, said the Coast Guard had identified the missing man as 60. Those two ages do not match. This story uses the police confirmation that the body was the man from Thursday’s call, and it leaves the one-year difference on the record instead of picking a number the outlets did not reconcile. His name was not in the WLUC account of the release.

What Thursday’s call was

The Marquette Police Department said officers were sent at about 2:53 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 5, on a 911 call that a man had gone into the lake near Presque Isle Park. Witnesses told officers he was washed off the rocks and was last seen being pulled south out of the Black Rocks cove. First responders checked the shore and did not find him. Police said the lake was too rough Thursday for a search on the water.

WPBN reported that a helicopter crew from Coast Guard Air Station Traverse City launched at first light Friday, while the search was still a search. CBS Detroit, citing the police account of the missing-person call, said the Coast Guard and Marquette police were among the agencies looking and asked anyone with information to call the Coast Guard. The two stations did not agree on the helicopter’s model number, so this story does not use one. That air search is the morning’s first chapter. The recovery in Harvey is the later one.

Who was on the recovery

WLUC said the Chocolay Township Police Department, the Marquette County Sheriff’s Office, the Chocolay Township Fire Department, and UPHS-Marquette EMS assisted with the body recovery. Thursday’s missing-person response, as the stations listed it from the police account, also included Marquette Fire, Northern Michigan University police, and Department of Natural Resources conservation officers. Harvey is south of the city, in Chocolay Township, which is why township police were the agency on the beach call.

MLive, quoting Marquette fire officials after Thursday’s call, carried the warning the department posted: “Do not underestimate this lake.” The fire statement said what looks manageable from shore can become life-threatening, and it named currents, cold water, and sudden changes. MLive also reported that a gale warning was up and that waves on Lake Superior had been forecast as high as 17 feet when the call came in just before 3 p.m.

What is still not public

The name is not public in the reports read for this story. The age is in conflict between the Friday police release, as WLUC quoted it, and the earlier Coast Guard figure CBS used. A cause is not in either account. People who were at the rocks Thursday and have not already talked to an officer still have information the investigators may want, but the public request CBS carried was for the search, and the search, police said, is no longer a search.

The photograph is the lake at Presque Isle. It does not show Thursday’s call, and it does not show the beach at Lakewood Lane where officers made the recovery.

Sources:
WLUC, “Police recover man swept off Black Rocks Thursday,” Nov. 6, 2026 (Marquette police release: 8:22 a.m. recovery near Lakewood Lane in Harvey, 62-year-old from Calumet, assisting agencies), https://www.uppermichiganssource.com/2026/11/06/police-recover-man-swept-off-black-rocks-thursday/
CBS Detroit, “Coast Guard continues search after man reported swept into Lake Superior,” updated 10:03 a.m. Nov. 6, 2026 (age 60, 2:53 p.m. call, agencies). This account is earlier than the recovery, https://www.cbsnews.com/detroit/news/man-missing-marquette-lake-superior/
WPBN, “Traverse City Coast Guard helicopter joins search for missing man in Lake Superior,” Nov. 6, 2026 (first-light helicopter, witnesses, Thursday agencies), https://upnorthlive.com/news/local/traverse-city-coast-guard-helicopter-joins-search-for-missing-man-in-lake-superior-marquette-presque-isle-park-black-rocks-upper-peninsula-michigan-upnorthlive
MLive, “Do not underestimate this lake,” Nov. 6, 2026 (fire department warning, gale warning, wave forecast), https://www.mlive.com/news/2026/11/do-not-underestimate-this-lake-authorities-to-search-lake-superior-after-man-swept-off-black-rocks.html
Photo: Hitoubashira, “Presque Isle Lake Superior.jpg”, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3APresque_Isle_Lake_Superior.jpg

Marquette

Tags: Marquette · Lake Superior · Presque Isle · Harvey · Public safety