Maurice Shutter, 56, missing, feared drowned in volcanic crater lake The search is continuing at Lake Eacham for a 56-year-old man who has been missing since Sunday. MYSTERY surrounds the disappearance of a 56-year-old man at a popular swim hole on the Atherton Tablelands on Sunday. Ravenshoe man Maurice Shutter, 56, also known as Maurice Packham, vanished without a trace at volcanic Lake Eacham, missing feared drowned, as he paddled an inflatable boat out of sight of others. Highly-trained police divers are unable to search the silt-covered floor of the rainforest-fringed freshwater lake. Lake Eacham, known in Aboriginal Ngadon myth as Yidyam, is too deep, too dark, and beyond safe diving limits. The volcanic crater lake has a depth of 65m and was formed at least 10,000 years ago. Senior officers told how sonar scans and computer modelling of the lake floor for any sign of the missing man's body has also been ruled out. It is understood the different layers of thousands of years of floating sediment and debris would distort any reading. Locals have told of sightings of large scrub pythons swimming in the blue waters and of sudden electrical storms and lightning strikes on the lake. Malanda SES member Tania Gale has been helping search for the man missing at Lake Eacham since Sunday. But detectives expect the most plausible scenario is the missing man had a heart attack, fell out of the raft, and drowned. Police today deployed the Emergency Management Queensland helicopter for the second day in a row as SES crews again scoured the rim of the volcanic lake that takes about 45 minutes to circumnavigate on a walk. The man, whose name has not been released, was with a female companion and two children who raised the alarm when they spotted the empty boat about 11am. Free divers, who practice deep diving in the lake, also unsuccessfully searched the spot where he was suspected to have gone missing. Police expect, if the man did drown, his body will surface in coming days. Originally published as Ancient lake holds a new mystery