He thought it was a piece of trash. Bright orange—maybe a worn-out, discarded old lifejacket.
It was Matthew Bailey’s underwear. Bailey had been reported missing wearing only underwear, a shirt and jacket eight days prior. There were record low temperatures those days, in addition to days of South Florida’s striking hot sun.
“I saw bright orange-red,” said Rod Nelson, a former military medic and Naples resident on his first search and rescue on that mid-November day in the Bayshore area of Naples.
“There was so much trash back there. I saw that and really thought that was an old orange life vest or just jumbled up trash. I thought no way it’s him,” Nelson recalled…