Snorkeler Left Behind on Great Barrier Reef

Here's a nightmare travel story from USA Today: Australian officials said Wednesday they were investigating a dive boat company that accidentally left behind a U.S. tourist snorkeling on the Great Barrier Reef, forcing him to swim to another boat for help.

The 28-year-old Michigan native said he was snorkeling on Saturday when he lifted his head out of the water and realized his tour boat, the Passions of Paradise, was nowhere in sight. The case echoes the story of Tom and Eileen Lonergan, an American couple who died in 1998 after their tour boat left while they were scuba diving on the reef. Their story inspired the 2003 movie Open Water.

A spokeswoman for the state work safety agency, Workplace Health and Safety Queensland, confirmed that the department was investigating the incident, but declined to comment further.

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