By Jack McCarthy
The Chicago Tribune

MONTGOMERY, Ill. — The search for a missing Montgomery teen who disappeared Sunday while swimming with friends in the Fox River shifted from a search to a recovery operation, officials said Monday.

Officials with the Oswego Fire Protection District said late Monday that they would continue efforts to recover the body of Robert Funston, 18, a recent Oswego High School graduate. Search operations were expected to resume Tuesday morning.

"Obviously the survivability in the water — with that current and those hazardous conditions — is minimal, at best," said district Battalion Chief Bill Perkins.

Funston was with four other teens Sunday when he was reportedly pulled underwater by a strong current. The remaining teens searched for their friend before calling for help. Perkins said there was no indication of alcohol or drug use by the teens.

But there may have been a longer interval, possibly 1 1/2 hours, between Funston's disappearance and the other teens' call for help than originally indicated, he said.

About a dozen bystanders watched Monday as workers from local police, fire and emergency service agencies searched near the Washington Street/U.S. Highway 34 bridge that crosses the river into the Kendall County community's downtown area.

Darnell Lash, 17, a soon-to-be senior at Oswego High School, said he was swimming with Funston and several others Sunday near the bridge when he saw Funston bob up and down, then go under.

"I thought he was stuck under a tree, but I couldn't find him," Lash said. "The current was just too fast."

As many as 40 personnel from four local fire and rescue agencies have participated in the search, which began late Sunday afternoon after Funston disappeared in the river south of downtown Oswego.

An Illinois State Police airplane, nine watercraft and a diver from the Aurora Fire Department were involved in the search operations, which covered 6 1/2 miles of the Fox River, from Oswego to Yorkville.

"It was excessively hard for [the diver] to operate in those conditions, and we're not doing any more dive operations," said John Lehman, an Aurora Fire Department assistant chief.

The high school plans to staff a crisis support center for students. Officials will use their Web site and a parent phone-notification system to spread the word when they decide on the hours the school will be open.

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