122 anglers had to be rescued from a Minnesota lake after becoming stranded on an ice floe after 'unseasonably warm weather'
Dec 30, 2023, 19:40 IST
- 122 anglers were stranded on an ice floe that broke off from the shoreline of a Minnesota lake.
- Bystanders attempted a rescue by canoe, but four individuals fell into the open water.
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One hundred and twenty-two anglers were rescued from an ice floe on the Upper Red Lake in Minnesota on Friday evening, the Beltrami County Sheriff's Office wrote in a press release on social media.
The anglers were stranded in a southeastern lake area after a sheet of floating ice detached from the main shoreline. Thirty feet of open water separated the stranded group from dry land after the floe broke off. Before emergency responders arrived, bystanders attempted a rescue with a canoe, resulting in four individuals falling into the freezing water. They were quickly pulled back on to the ice floe and kept warm in a fishing shelter.Local emergency teams responded to a call to the Beltrami County Emergency Communications Center at 4:57 pm, undertaking a coordinated effort to evacuate those stranded on the ice safely.An Integrated Public Alert and Warning System Wireless Emergency Alert guided anglers on the ice to the designated evacuation area.Rescuers using boats and hovercraft reached the group at 6:40 p.m. There were no reported injuries, including among the four individuals who fell from the canoe into the water.Dramatic footage showed rescuers battling blizzard conditions as night fell to save the fishermen stranded on the lake close to the Canadian border.
Sheriff Jason Riggs praised the efficiency and speed of the local emergency responders. Because of their successful response, additional state resources requested for assistance were canceled.The day before the incident, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources shared a news release warning of poor ice conditions across the state due to unseasonably warm weather.According to the DNR, there had been at least three ice-angler rescues from Upper Red Lake between December 17 — when 35 people needed to be rescued — and the major operation on Friday.When the incident took place, Beltrami County was reportedly experiencing a temperature of 33.8°F, or 1°C.