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After suspending the search for a missing 13 year old swimmer, authorities plan to resume the search in Garden City at first light, around 5:30 am, Friday morning.
The 13-year-old Maryland boy disappeared around 12:30 Thursday afternoon while swimming in the ocean, in between 15th and 16th Avenue South in Garden City.
Authorities say it is now considered a recovery mission instead of a rescue mission.
Dozens of first responders spent the entire day searching the area with hundreds of people looking on, even helping.
Authorities were in the water -- rafts, boats, jet skis, and in the air with helicopters. On lookers even joined the search, as about 100 people locked arm in arm and combed the shore, searching for the missing teen.
"It's always difficult when it comes to any child. It's a lot harder to swallow, a lot harder to take," said Sgt. Robert Kegler, with Horry County Police.
Authorities say the boy was swimming with seven other friends in the ocean when someone noticed several of the boys were struggling in the water.
That's when a lifeguard jumped in to help bring the boys to shore, but one was left behind in what were rough waters all day long.
"The most challenging has been the physical conditions, the weather itself. You can feel the strong winds out here, the currents a lot higher. The waves are a lot stronger than it normally is. It's made it very difficult," said Kegler.
Those who were in the water noticed.
"Very tiring, because you have to keep fighting your way back, it's exhausting," recalled George Denton, of Surfside Beach.
"As you can see it's windy and the current is pulling really bad towards the north," said Randy Johnson, of Garden City.
"The currents are really bad. They're pulling you down the beach, and they're also pulling you out. The waves are pretty busy. One comes right after another. It's hard to time them like normal surf, so all those combined together, it can drag you out of here. If you're not careful out there, it's bad," said Denton.
Bad, even for really good swimmers
"A majority of swimmers who are really good still can only swim two to three miles per hour, a rip (current) can go as fast as six miles per hour, but we recommend they get on their back and let the rip (current) carry them out to the head of the rip (current) or try to swim parallel to the beach, but don't try to swim towards the beach," said Duke Brown, with Horry County Beach Patrol.
