I am not sure what you would consider the "best". Nothing good about a drowned person. Particularly kids. Certainly am not going to tell you about the multiple victims. I will however tell you something you may not be familiar with. When a person drowns they generally go right to the bottom. The only time they may float is if they were wearing a life jacket or if air got caught up in their clothing. It is important to know this. A floater is a person who drowned and ends up coming to the surface weeks or months later. What happens is the body purifies and gas forms in the body (depending on the depth obviously). At first one may not realize what they are seeing on the surface. Bloated, pure white, generally does not register to anyone it is a person.
Most vessels and all military and SAR vessels have what is known as a stokes litter on board. I am sure you have seen them, they are a basket with a wire frame. Used get injured people up and down ships ladders or tight spaces. Anyway, the first time I
found a floater my crew and myself were in fairly rough seas. It was getting dark.We put out the small boat to go retrieve the body. While getting the body in the litter, the blanket that we covered the bottom with came off. Nobody really notice at the time.
We got litter into the water, one crew went in an put the body into the litter. A quick couple pulls and it was on the small boat.
Now, when we got back to the ship they had already rigged some lines over the side to pick the litter up to the deck. About 15 feet or so. The lines got tossed down, the litter got secured, the winch got turning, litter started go up the side, body started dripping through the stokes litter like it was being sieved. Just a gelatinous mass oozing through the wire frame. What was left of the face included.
