"On the afternoon of Sunday, August 11, 2024, a few hours after attending church with his wife and three children, Ryan Borgwardt, a 44-year-old carpenter, left home with his kayak, tackle box, and fishing rod and arrived at Big Green Lake, one of the deepest lakes in Wisconsin. The Perseid meteor shower was expected to peak that night, one of the best times of the year to see shooting stars."
"Vande Kolk, 47, was second in command of the department. Just back from a week's vacation, he was hoping for a quiet day to catch up on paperwork. As Vande Kolk pulled onto a two-lane road, he alerted dispatchers that he was signing in for duty. Then he drove the roads he'd traveled since he was a boy, across prairies ripening with sweet corn and soybeans, gently sloping fields that met blue sky at the horizon."
On the afternoon of Sunday, August 11, 2024, Ryan Borgwardt, a 44-year-old carpenter, left home with a kayak, tackle box, and fishing rod and arrived at Big Green Lake. He launched the kayak around 10 p.m., paddled toward the lake's deepest western end, and observed the Perseid meteor shower. A little after 6 a.m. the next morning, Chief Deputy Matthew Vande Kolk kissed his family goodbye, signed in for duty, and drove county roads he knew since childhood. Green Lake County has about 19,000 predominantly white, churchgoing residents who work in farming and local businesses. Deputies handle comparatively low volumes of traffic crashes, child abuse, burglary, and fraud.
Read at The Atlantic
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