Recovery efforts are set to resume today on Lake Lanier for a man who went missing late Friday and is presumed to have drowned.

Authorities had trouble searching for the man, identified as 44-year-old Jeffrey Nause, over the weekend because of heavy boat traffic, resorting on Sunday to sonar searches only.

“We did have one hit (Sunday) ... and unfortunately it (turned out to be) an underwater buoy,” said Sgt. Mike Burgamy, Lake Lanier supervisor for the Georgia Department of Natural Resources.

Authorities first learned of Nause’s disappearance just after midnight Friday, when the Hall County Sheriff’s Office responded to a report of a drowning around Lake Lanier Islands.

Upon arrival, deputies learned that Nause had “entered the water from a boat to take a swim,” according to a press release issued by sheriff’s spokesman Sgt. Stephen Wilbanks.

“Initial reports indicate that at some point Mr. Nause became distressed, went under, and did not resurface,” Wilbanks said.

Sheriff’s investigators and dive team members worked through early Saturday gathering initial information regarding the incident and began their searches just after noon.

They spent about four to five hours in the water.

“Water depths in the area range from 70-140 feet (and are) in an area that is heavy with underwater timber,” Wilbanks said.

Sunday’s search was limited to sonar searches because of heavy boat traffic, which creates hazardous dive conditions, the spokesman said.

“Crews will mark likely sonar targets for closer inspection when dive operations resume (this) morning,” Wilbanks said.

But even sonar operations were difficult, Burgamy said.

“You can’t run that side-scan (sonar) with all that traffic going on. It’s just too hard,” he said.

Hall County Fire Services and a Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office dive team also took part in the search efforts.

The case is being investigated as an accidental drowning but remains under investigation by the sheriff’s office’s Criminal Investigations Division, Wilbanks said.

Five people already have drowned this year on Lake Lanier, one earlier this month. There also have been five boating-related fatalities on the lake.