VIDEO: Human Remains Found in Barrel at Lake Mead’s Receding Shoreline

National Park Service (NPS) officials and the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department (LVMPD) said a person’s remains were found at Lake Mead recently and the investigation was in the early stages.

Rangers scoured the area near Hemenway Harbor on Sunday once a witness reported finding a barrel with the remains stuffed inside, according to KSNV.

“They set a perimeter and the NPS Investigative Service Branch is coordinating with LVMPD Crime Scene Investigations to recover the remains,” the outlet continued, noting the person’s identity and cause of death would be determined by the medical examiner.

Video footage showed the area around the lake and images of the decaying barrel laying near the water’s edge:

Local resident Shawna Hollister provided images of the container, the KSNV article said.

“My husband heard a woman scream and then he went to look and found the body in a very deteriorated 50 gal drum,” Hollister recalled, adding, “He found a man that was mostly bones, except for some of his shirt and belt showing.”

According to Hollister, the two alerted park rangers to the situation.

Journalist David Charnes said the barrel may have been exposed because of the lake’s low water levels:

Meanwhile, the body could have been dumped there in the 1980s, a police lieutenant told the Las Vegas Review-Journal on Monday.

“We are going to try to reach out to UNLV to have a scientist kind of give us an estimate regarding the corrosion of the barrel, looking at the marine life, to solidify a timeline,” Las Vegas police Lt. Ray Spencer explained, adding it was obviously a homicide.

The discovery happened because of the lake’s low water levels, and Spencer also noted the container might have been dumped out of someone’s boat.

“We do have some items that were recovered inside the barrel,” he continued. “We are going to see if we can make a link in terms of identification. It is a very uphill battle in trying to get the victim identified and solve the case.”