CONWAY -- Searchers recovered from Beaverfork Lake on Tuesday the body of a fisherman who had been missing since Friday.
John Allen Sanders, 59, of Conway had retired only recently from the Conway Sanitation Department, Faulkner County Coroner Patrick Moore said.
A preliminary autopsy did not show a cause of death, so authorities will have to wait for further tests, Moore said.
Sanders had "a significant medical issue," Moore said. "I'm not looking at this as an accidental death until they [medical examiners] rule out" natural causes.
Moore said he does not suspect foul play.
Conway Fire Chief Mike Winter said a boater reported seeing a capsized boat on the lake about 5:30 p.m. Friday. Sanders' family said he had left about 7:30 a.m. that day to go fishing and identified the boat as his, Winter said.
Emergency workers from the city's Fire Department and the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission searched the area that evening, on Saturday until storms hit that night, and on Sunday and Monday.
Searchers were on the lake again about 9 a.m. Tuesday, when two fishermen on the north side of a spillway "saw the body and motioned for our guys who were on the lake," Winter said.
State Desk on 06/11/2014