A YOUNG man who drowned at a popular waterway near Townsville yesterday has been identified as Dane Bracey.

The 18-year-old was swimming at Big Crystal Creek with his friends when he was swept away by flowing water and pinned under a log beneath the surface.

District duty officer Senior Sergeant Joe Matheson said the teen had leapt from a spot about 3m above the water into the fast-flowing rapids.

"He went underwater and came back up again," Sen-Sgt Matheson said.

"At this point he yelled 'help, help' but at that stage the friends with him thought he was just playing a joke.

"But he went under again and his girlfriend tried to enter the water which was rapidly flowing with fresh floodwaters from the upper Paluma."

His friends tried frantically to pull him to safety and revive him, but their CPR efforts could not save him.

Mr Bracey's Facebook profile says he is a electronics technician at Ruswin Integrated Security Systems.

In a heart-breaking post online last night, Mr Bracey's mother, Gail, told of her loss.

"Today a part of my soul and all of my heart has broken into a thousand pieces, I don't know how I'm going to get thru (sic) this," she wrote.

"Our beautiful, kind and wonderful son, Dane Bracey drowned in an accident, swimming at Crystal Creek."