DoorDash executive among 8 dead in boating accident on Lake Tahoe

Washington Post

25-06-2025

Eight people including an executive at DoorDash died in a boating accident Saturday at Lake Tahoe, California, officials said, in an unexpectedly powerful afternoon storm that capsized and grounded multiple boats at the popular tourist destination.
The El Dorado County Sheriff's Office said an emergency was reported shortly before 3 p.m. on Saturday near D.L. Bliss State Park, on the southwestern shore of the lake. As waves reached heights of up to eight feet, a boat capsized, sending 10 people into the water, the sheriff's office said.
Zach Shearer, an operations manager at Tahoe Sportfishing, said the storm came 'up out of nowhere so fast,' turning the cold but calm afternoon into a tumult of wind and snow. 'The big thing was the wind and how it shifted, and how it really wasn't in the forecast,' he said. '... It was bad.'
The local family business had all of its fishing charter boats on the water at the time, Shearer said. One was caught in the storm and rode it out, and the rest managed to get to safety, he added.
Two people were rescued. The last body was recovered on Monday. The sheriff's office said it 'expresses it's deepest condolences to the families of those who have been affected by this tragic event.'
Josh Pickles, 37, a corporate employee at DoorDash who lived in San Francisco, was among the victims, as was his father, Terry Pickles, 73, and mother, Paula Bozinovich, 71, both of Redwood City, California. In a statement, DoorDash's chief financial officer Ravi Inukonda said Pickles left behind a wife and daughter. 'We are heartbroken by the tragic accident that took the life of our beloved colleague,' he said.
The victims of the boating accident were between the ages of 37 and 73. Five were from California and three from New York. They were celebrating the birthday of one in the party, local media reported, and were on board a 27-foot gold vessel made by Chris-Craft, a luxury powerboat company, when the change in weather brought reported 30-knot winds, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.
Several boats on Lake Tahoe capsized or were grounded because of the afternoon storm, said the Office of Spill Prevention and Response, part of the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. Its team deployed to address fuel spillage from damaged vessels.
The National Weather Service had issued a wind advisory for that afternoon for neighboring Mono County. But Matthew Chyba, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Reno, Nevada, told the Associated Press that the severity of the weather exceeded predictions on the lake.
The water temperature of the alpine lake dipped to a low of about 45 degrees on Saturday, according to the Tahoe Environmental Research Center at the University of California at Davis.