Drowning machines: Risks around low-head dams learned one tragedy at a time [Video]

(InvestigateTV) — It started with a cryptic call from her daughter’s cell phone. First responders could be heard on the other end, saying they’d found her backpack and her phone before the line went dead.

Christina Brockwell spent the rest of that frantic afternoon checking hospitals and emergency dispatch centers as she tried to reach her 23-year-old daughter Lauren Winstead.

When she pulled into a Richmond, Virginia fire station and saw Lauren’s dog sitting there without her — the former ER nurse said she knew.

“One of the firemen I actually knew prior to this, and I just remember, I said, ‘I don’t need a private spot. Tell me what happened,’ and he said, ‘She’s missing’,” Brockwell said. “And I remember just looking at him and saying, ‘This sure feels different from this side of the fence.’”