Drowning victim known as avid outdoorswoman.

Byline: Bob Keefer The Register-Guard

Renee Wyser-Pratte came to Oregon to study law but stayed in the Northwest when she fell in love with the outdoors here, her friends and co-workers said Monday.

That love affair turned tragic on Sunday when the 34-year-old Eugene woman drowned in a kayaking accident on the McKenzie River.

Wyser-Pratte was a rising young lawyer at a prominent local firm. She was fluent in French - her late father was from France - and interested in art and music. She was an avid outdoorswoman and had worked with Eugene Mountain Rescue.

"She came to the West Coast and fell in love with it," her best friend, Tanya O'Neil, said Monday. "She was vivacious. She was full of life. Full of energy. And she had a real capacity for love. She loved a lot of people."

Wyser-Pratte had just become president in January of the board of directors at Eugene Glass School, where she was learning to blow glass and had been a board member since last year.

"What Renee did for the glass school was monumental," said fellow board member Candy Moffett on Monday. "We could not be who we are today without her tremendous commitment and drive. She really knew how to take the wheel and drive us."

A 2001 graduate of the University of Oregon School of Law and a 1993 graduate of the University of Vermont, Wyser-Pratte was an associate at the Eugene law firm of Gleaves Swearingen Potter & Scott. She specialized in creditors' rights and bankruptcy.

"She was a very promising young lawyer," said Bill Martin, the firm's managing partner. "We expected to make her a partner within the next year or two."

Martin said Wyser-Pratte was unusually warm and outgoing. "She was in charge of scheduling our last firm retreat and exhibited a great sense of humor. She brought a lot of energy to what is normally kind of a boring deal," he said.

Wyser-Pratte was very active in community affairs in Eugene. She had moved here to study law from New York, where she was business manager of an architectural design and construction management firm.

In 2002, she received the Andrew Clement Award for her volunteer work with Lane County Legal Aid.

Wyser-Pratte accomplished all this despite suffering from lupus, an arthritic condition with painful flare-ups.

"There were times she was doing great and times when it was a real struggle for her," said UO law school professor Margaret Paris. "She was a really upbeat, vivacious person. She was just a real joy."

Wyser-Pratte drowned early Sunday afternoon while kayaking with O'Neil, a colleague at the law firm, on the McKenzie River near its confluence with the Mohawk River, north of Hayden Bridge Road.

"We were just floating in our individual Tahiti (kayaks)," said O'Neil. "We didn't notice a submerged tree. I flipped right after she flipped. It was a battle for survival at that point."

John Miller, coordinator of Lane County Sheriff's search and rescue team, said Wyser-Pratte first hit a snag that knocked her over. She was able to right herself, Miller said, but then encountered a second snag, which had caused another drowning last year.

There she flipped again and her T-shirt tangled with the log, holding her under water. Three people in a drift boat saw the accident and called 911 but were afraid to attempt the rescue themselves. By the time help arrived she had been under water for 22 minutes, Miller said. She was carrying a life jacket but was not wearing it, he said.

Wyser-Pratte was recently divorced and had no children. She is survived by her mother, Jean Templeton, of Boise; a sister, Michele Karnow, also of Boise; and her former husband, Jeffrey Frederick, of Eugene.

Plans for a memorial service were still uncertain on Monday; arrangements are being handled by Musgrove Family Mortuary.