The search for a missing 15-year-old Stagg High School student believed to have jumped into a levee in Stockton following a campus fight continued through Thursday and will resume Friday morning.

The San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Office’s boating unit searched through the body of water that connects to the Calaveras River since 2 p.m. Wednesday and will continue to do so. It paused operations on Thursday afternoon after a second day of searching.

Stockton Unified School District spokesperson Melinda Meza said two students got into a fight at the high school campus. Two other students who were wearing ski masks also jumped into the brawl before school administrators broke it up.

“Administrators didn’t know if (the people wearing masks) were actual students,” Meza said. “They thought there’s maybe intruders, so they called the SROs (school resource officers).”

She said when police attempted to identify the two people wearing masks, they fled off of the campus.

District officials later determined that all boys involved in the altercation were Stagg students.

An officer who was returning to campus after lunch drove onto the levee to see if he could spot the teens and from a distance allegedly saw two boys on an island in the levee.

The officer alleged that both of the boys jumped into the levee. District officials said they had concerns about hypothermia and the speed of the water currents.

Rescue personnel search, on Thursday, March 14, 2024, for a teen that jumped into a levee connected to the Calaveras River near Stagg High School in Stockton, Calif., on March 13. Two teenagers ran and jumped into the water after school administrators approached them after an altercation. One of the teens surfaced. (Victoria Franco/Bay City News)

District officials said the officer drove to the other side of the levee to reach the kids and was told by one of the boys that his friend could still possibly be in the water.

The San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Office was contacted for assistance and their boating crews worked until 8 p.m. Wednesday attempting to locate the teen.

Stockton Unified School District superintendent Michelle Rodriguez said the district and the student’s parents have hope that he possibly is alive but scared to come home.

District officials said they are considering releasing the name of the teen to the media in an attempt to get him to come forward.

The Sheriff’s Office is “bringing in the latest technology so that if in fact, we do have a passing, then we can make sure that the family has some closure to that,” Rodriguez said.

Counselors have been on campus to offer support to students, staff and families who are having difficulty with the search of the student.