Skeleton 'Tea Party' Found in Colorado River

Thankfully the skeletons are plastic
By Arden Dier,  Newser Staff
Posted May 6, 2015 12:48 PM CDT

A man snorkeling in the Colorado River received quite the fright on Monday when he spotted what he thought were human remains about 40 feet below the surface near the Arizona-California border. With a little investigating, however, a diver with the Buckskin Fire Department uncovered a scene much more comical than grisly, the Arizona Republic reports: two fake skeletons wearing sunglasses, sitting peacefully in lawn chairs attached to rocks on the riverbed. In a statement, per NBC News, the La Paz County Sheriff's Office said the scene looked rather like "an underwater tea party." Officer Curtis Bagby tells the AP the stunt was probably just a practical joke. "I don't think they were trying to set up anything to scare anyone," he says.

A sign with the skeletons includes the words "Bernie" and "dream in the river," which Bagby says could be a reference to the movie Weekend at Bernie's; in one scene in the film, the corpse of a man named Bernie falls into the water from a boat. The sign was also dated Aug. 16, 2014, which may indicate when the skeleton tea party began. Authorities will crash the party at some point this week, though, as they plan to remove the plastic skeletons and chairs from the river. Bagby says they may even find a new home outside the sheriff's department. "We like to show some things that are fun, some levity, too," he says. As for who left the skeletons in the water, officers say that will likely remain a mystery as they have no plans to pursue an investigation. (More Colorado River stories.)

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