The Friday the 13th franchise has explored how Jason Voorhees drowned in a lake as a child and seeks vengeance on anyone who may have been preoccupied imbibing in drugs or practicing pre-marital sex to notice he was in trouble. To pay tribute to the character, a group of SCUBA divers planted a statue of the character at the bottom of Lake Pleasant near Phoenix, Arizona, though park officials consider it litter.
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An Arizona diver, Zachary Nagy, claimed to the Arizona Republic that the lake itself offers little to look at underwater, with divers traditionally bringing fun and quirky objects into the lake for other divers to enjoy. In addition to the Voorhees statue, there are reportedly Christmas trees and skeletons sitting around a poker table at the bottom of the lake.
Nagy also takes responsibility for placing the statue in the lake last May.
“There’s not much out there [to see],” the diver shared. “They put it out there to kind of practice skills.”
He added, “That’s why we put Jason down there at night, because we weren’t sure what the reaction was going to be. At first, when we put him down there we didn’t tell anyone we were the ones who put him down.”
Seeing such objects at the bottom of a lake would understandably take some divers by surprise and offer a laugh, but park officials aren’t amused with the potential impact the debris could have on the lake’s ecosystem.
“We really have to be mindful and respectful of nature,” said David Jordan, Lake Pleasant Regional Park supervisor. “That’s one of our biggest things.”
“I was a little surprised to see something of that nature,” Jordan noted. “There’s always a little bit of humor behind it but at the same time, we’re very much concerned about … trying to maintain clean facilities for people to enjoy.”
With a clean-up effort scheduled for September 22nd, the statue will likely be removed by that date.
This isn’t the only location of an underwater statue of Jason Voorhees, as groups of divers have reported a similar statue appearing in a popular diving location in Crosby, Minnesota. That statue was placed in the lake in 2013, with the character growing more decrepit over the years, making it look even more horrifying.
With no new Friday the 13th movie on the horizon, fans will have to take whatever Voorhees excitement they can get.
Do you think the statue should be removed? Let us know in the comments below or hit up @TheWolfman on Twitter to talk all things horror and Star Wars!
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