Spencer M. Korwin, a former Team USA triathlete and wellness entrepreneur, drowned during a morning swim on Wednesday, September 2, 2026, while his family was vacationing on Shelter Island, N.Y. He was 38. Relatives and friends gathered in Manhattan on Sunday, September 6, for his funeral.
The father of two young daughters went into the water about 8 a.m. that Wednesday from the dock of the hotel where he and his relatives were lodging, according to Shelter Island Police Det. Sgt. Jack Thilberg. Divers found him underwater beside that same dock about seven hours later.
Several outlets have named the property as the Pridwin Hotel, though Shelter Island police have not confirmed the name themselves.
How the Search Unfolded
When Korwin did not come back from the water, his wife notified hotel staff, who called emergency services at about 12:03 p.m. on September 2. Shelter Island Town Police officers, Shelter Island Fire Department firefighters and Shelter Island Town Emergency Medical Services (EMS) crews responded shortly after noon to a report of a missing swimmer, police said.
Crews worked the Crescent Beach-North Channel area of Shelter Island Sound and the waterways around it, with police helicopters overhead and multiple marine units on the water. Shelter Island EMS added two ambulances and several volunteers to the marine and air response.
Divers located Korwin about 3 p.m., and authorities concluded that drowning had killed him. Thilberg said detectives, working alongside the Suffolk County Medical Examiner’s Office, regard the death as accidental and have found no indication of criminality. Police said the investigation remains open, and the medical examiner will set the official cause and manner of death.
Police have not said what caused Korwin, an experienced open-water swimmer, to go under, and no witnesses have been reported. He was swimming alone from a private dock, not a lifeguarded beach.
Conditions on the Water That Day
John Kirincic, a master mariner for the Southold Town Police Department’s Marine One, spoke to the Shelter Island Reporter about the weather. “There was no fog or anything bad,” he said. Even so, Kirincic noted, the current in that stretch of water is frequently strong because of the narrow passage the tide runs through.
Laurie Eckardt, a lifelong Shelter Island resident, told the Shelter Island Reporter, “People are not familiar with the waters around here.” Korwin’s death was the area’s second apparent drowning of the summer. Timothy Magambo, 18, of Pelham, died off Wades Beach in May.
A Fixture on the East End Circuit
Korwin graduated from Syracuse University in 2010. He qualified for Team USA Triathlon in 2012, raced at the World Championships in Auckland, New Zealand, and that same year became a Gatorade-sponsored athlete. At the 2012 age-group triathlon world championships in Auckland, he finished 36th overall in 1 hour, 20 minutes, 43 seconds, including a 13:27 swim.
He was a familiar face closer to home in Long Island’s endurance-sports scene, piling up podium finishes at races across the East End. On his LinkedIn profile, he noted that he had won both the Montauk Point Lighthouse Triathlon and the Mighty Montauk Sprint Triathlon.
In 2021 he founded Korwin Health & Wellness, advising competitive athletes and ordinary clients on rest, nutrition and balancing the demands of daily life, all while logging his own training hours for Ironman and Ironman 70.3 events. He described his work as helping people “achieve goals that once seemed out of reach.”
His grandfather, Irving Korwin, was a World War II veteran who founded Wideband Coin Jewelry. He died in 2020 in Arizona.
Two days after Korwin’s death, Josh Grosbard and Jeffrey Witten launched a GoFundMe campaign for his daughters’ education. As of the morning of Sunday, September 6, it had raised more than $262,000 from 600 donors against a $300,000 goal, with the largest listed gift an anonymous $38,000 donation. “He was the sun around which so many of our lives orbited, and his loss is being felt deeply by everyone who knew and loved him,” the organizers wrote on the page.
Funeral Service
The funeral service began at 1:30 p.m. on Sunday, September 6, at Temple Israel, 112 E. 75th St. in Manhattan. Burial followed at Beth Moses Cemetery in West Babylon, per Star of David Memorial Chapels. The family sat shiva at a private home in Mamaroneck through Wednesday, September 9.
Korwin is survived by his wife, Carly Korwin, and their two daughters, Sadie, four, and Colette, one. The couple married on the beach in Bridgehampton, and he was a regular presence in the Hamptons.
A small island town between the North and South forks of eastern Long Island, Shelter Island draws heavy summer traffic from vacationing families, and town police and volunteer emergency crews patrol its waters. The missing-swimmer call on September 2 pulled in departments from across the area before divers ended the search that afternoon.
Police have described the drowning as accidental, but the investigation is continuing, and the Suffolk County Medical Examiner’s Office has yet to issue its findings on the official cause and manner of death.
