The remains of at at least five people have been found in two cars at the bottom of a western Oklahoma lake, authorities said Tuesday.
The vehicles, possibly missing for more than 40 years, were removed from Foss Lake in Elk City and might help solve cold cases from decades ago.
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A submerged Camaro matches the description of a vehicle that went missing 1970 along with three teenagers. The other, a Chevrolet, has been missing along with two people since the late 1950s, the Daily Elk Citian reported.
"It's just been under water for 40 years. It's a mucky mess," Sheriff Bruce Peoples of Custer County told KWEY radio.
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Dive teams found the rusty cars last week while training with sonar in the lake, said Betsy Randolph, an Oklahoma Highway Patrol spokeswoman.
"So they went back and did a scheduled dive today and were going to recover the cars," she said. "When they pulled the cars out of the water, the first one that came out, they found bones in the car."
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The second car also contained bones. The divers went back in the water and retrieved a human skull.
These skeletal remains were taken to the medical examiner's office.
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The Oklahoma Bureau of Investigation, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, the state medical examiner's office and the Custer County Sheriff's Department were all at the site Tuesday.
Authorities have not yet identified all of the remains. Randolph hopes that the discovery will bring closure to the families.
With News Wire Services
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