CASCO - A well-known employee of the National Weather Service in Gray drowned this morning in Sebago Lake as he swam out to his sailboat off Musson Road.

Art Lester apparently swam out to his 20-foot sailboat about 100 yards off shore and was swimming back to the mooring when he went under just before 10 a.m., witnesses told the Maine Warden Service. They described the conditions as windy with a mild chop on the water's surface.

Public safety agencies launched a search with the help of the Portland Water District security patrol found Lester's body at 11:30 a.m. in about 15 feet of water.

Lester is in his early 60s and lives in Casco not far from his boat's anchorage.
He was known as a congenial member of the National Weather Service, with whom he worked for at least 20 years. He developed a rapport with the public and was often called upon to conduct media interviews and answer questions from the public.

For years he was the voice of the National Weather Service in Gray when the station recorded its own radio weather broadcasts, and many listeners lodged complaints when he was replaced by a computer recording, said Al Wheeler, the meteorologist in charge at the station.

Lester was a hydro meteorological technician, with an experienced eye for measuring the nuances of Maine's weather, Wheeler said. He monitored stream and river flows and twice a day launched weather balloons to collect much of the data that the weather service, and by extension all of the state's media outlets, relied on in making forecasts.