WOODWARD — Woodward — Authorities have released the name of a man who drowned Tuesday evening at Fort Supply Lake.

Sean Henson, 28, of Woodward drowned about 100 yards away from the lake’s Small Beach swimming area while trying to rescue his dog, said Oklahoma Highway Patrol Trooper Johnny Chaffin of the patrol’s marine enforcement division.

Chaffin said Henson “was riding a jet ski and he and his dog came across right of shore about 150 yards out. His dog jumped off the jet ski, then he jumped off to get the dog.”

“The ski drifted away and the dog swam to shore, and then he (Henson) went under and never resurfaced. He wasn’t wearing a life jacket,” Chaffin said.

Chaffin said Henson’s body was located with sonar equipment on a rescue boat about 5:45 p.m. Tuesday about 12 feet deep below the area where witnesses said the man went under.

The Woodward County Dive Team tried to recover Henson’s body Tuesday but was unable to because of the high wind and white caps on the water, Chaffin said.

The recovery attempt was suspended about 9:30 p.m. due to darkness and efforts resumed at 8 a.m. on Wednesday.

Divers were able to bring up the body around 4:25 p.m., Wednesday, said Woodward County Sheriff Gary Stanley.

Throughout the day, officials battled tough wind and water conditions in an effort to get to the body.

The highway patrol boat they started with broke down after its starter switch got wet when high winds and waves came up.

Divers then swam to the area above where the body was located. But after about 45 minutes of fighting choppy water, the exhausted divers had to return to shore.

“It’s a tiresome deal,” David Connor, one of the divers, said after arriving back on the beach. “We’ll have to freshen up and get new divers, but we’ll go out as long as they need us to.”

Kevin Mitchell, another dive team member, said retrieval was difficult because “you can’t see anything down there. It’s totally by feel. You can’t see your hand in front of your face.”

The sonar equipment was then loaded on to another boat and authorities took that boat back to the area where they had located the body - eventually making the successful recovery.

Connie Shelite of Hugoton, Kan., who was camping at the park, was a witness to the events on Tuesday.

As Henson struggled in the water, he called for help, Shelite said.

“I tried to get him to hang in there, I yelled ‘hang in there, we’re getting help,’” she said. “He tried to get back to the ski, but it kept floating away.

“My husband ran up to the office and the boy there called it in. I just followed him (Henson) to keep an eye on where he was just hoping they were going to bring a boat to get him out of there quickly. It was too far out to swim (to him).”

Kayla Jimenez was swimming in the beach area on Tuesday and heard a man yelling “help me, help me.”

Jimenez borrowed a pair of binoculars from one of her fellow swimmers and tried to keep an eye on the man as he was bobbing in the water calling for help while others called 9-1-1.

“I was looking through the binoculars and could see that he kept coming up, saying ‘help me,’ but then he didn’t come up again,” she said, noting “he definitely wasn’t wearing a life jacket.”

She said others tried to help and one man raced down one of the rock piers to try and catch the jet ski, which was being pulled northward by the current, but was unable to do so.

“We all just wanted to jump in and do something but we couldn’t,” Jimenez.  “He was just too far out there.  No one could get to him.”

Fort Supply Park Ranger Cale Terry was the first official to arrive at the scene.

“It took me about a minute to get there, but I couldn’t save him,” Terry said Wednesday. “He was too far out and while we have a boat, it happened too quickly to go out to him.”

Woodward Emergency Management Director Matt Lehenbauer said the Woodward 9-1-1 center received a call at 4:55 p.m. Tuesday about a jet skier in distress and another call about 10 minutes later that the jet skier “could not be seen anymore.”

Lehenbauer described the conditions at the lake as “windy and rough” Tuesday afternoon.

Others who later responded to the scene were Woodward County EMS, Woodward and Fort Supply Fire Departments, Woodward Emergency Management, the Woodward County Sheriff’s Office, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol and the Army Corps of Engineers, in addition to Woodward’s dive team.

Divers first entered the water about 7:15 p.m. on Tuesday looking for the body.