Angels and Heroes

A fisherman fell through the ice on Beaver Lake this past week. We would have never even known—and the man who is alive to tell the tale would not have been—if it hadn’t been for our fisherman friend Bob, who frequently fishes from the dock a few doors down from us, always accompanied by his sweet dog, May. In the winter, Bob fishes on the ice away from the dock—auguring holes in different places around the small fire he makes in a barrel to keep himself warm. Now, as the ice thins, though, he is back on the dock. Some days the dock is surrounded by water; other days he punches a hole through the thin ice that has reformed over night. This time of year, just as the ice is coming off the lake, is reputed to be a time of great fishing. We wouldn’t know; my Bob is a terrible fisherman. (Don’t worry, this last statement has been approved by Bob).

That morning, Bob and May had driven in and gotten everything set up to fish. Fisherman Bob later said he looked up and saw someone walking out across the ice from the public access across the lake. Just as he was thinking, “Well, that’s a bad idea,” the guy vanished—just disappeared. Everything was silent. Bob thought, “Did I really see that?”—and the guy resurfaced, blowing out air like a seal. He yelled once, and then went back under. Then Bob watched as the guy tried to pull himself out—the ice breaking under him each time he tried to pull his body onto it. Bob called 9-1-1, and then began yelling to the guy—to let him know someone was here (often there isn’t) and that help was on its way.

It was those yells that my Bob heard. He was out in the yard burning piles of brush. He knew Bob and May had driven in, and he thought Bob was in trouble. He jumped on his four-wheeler and drove down to see how he could help. He found Bob and May a few docks down from where they usually fished, pulling out a neighbor’s rowboat to see if there was any way it might break through the ice to reach this guy. It wouldn’t. After a hurried exchange, my Bob raced back to the house, grabbed a couple of extension ladders, a throw bag, his climbing ropes and ice axes, threw them into the truck and tore out the driveway to get to the other side of the lake, knowing there wasn’t much time.

Hypothermia comes on quickly in water this cold—there is no doubt that this guy would be in late stages almost immediately. As Bob drove around the lake, he formulated a plan. He would tie the climbing ropes to the hook on the end of his truck winch, which, with all of them unspooled, he thought might reach the middle of the lake where the guy had fallen through. Bob would tie the two ladders together, lay down on one of them to spread his body weight over a much larger surface area, and use the ice axes to maneuver himself out to where the guy had fallen in, pulling the winch line and climbing rope out behind him. When he got as close as he could, he would move himself onto the ladder in back, and move the front ladder as close as possible to the hole the guy had fallen through. He would toss the throw bag to the guy, hoping he would have enough strength and where-with-all left to be able to wrap it around himself. Then Bob would pull the guy onto the ladder. By then, he hoped, help would be there, and someone would turn on the truck winch to pull them back onto the shore.

After Bob left the driveway, I heard the sound of helicopter rotors coming near. “Thank goodness,” I thought. Bob won’t have to try a rescue. I had no idea what his plan was at that point, I just know Bob. He would do everything possible to keep this guy from drowning. I just hoped he would also concentrate on keeping himself safe. With the arrival of the helicopter, even though I wondered where on earth they would find a landing spot, I knew he wouldn’t be trying to go this alone.

I went down to our dock to see what I could. As I watched, I was relieved to see a dark shape move across the ice very slowly, as if crawling. I knew at that point that the guy had gotten himself out of the water. I thought he was crawling toward his fishing buddies and their sled, but it turned out he had been fishing alone. The people I saw were the rescue crew. They wore dry suits, and one guy had actually jumped into the hole. It took three other rescuers to pull the two of them out. They inched along the ice until they reached the rescue sled, which is on inflatable buoys—like a boat underneath the sled. They got the guy onto the sled and pulled the sled to shore. Bob was there by this time, saw that not only the helicopter but an ambulance was already there, and watched as they stood the guy up, stripped off his wet clothes, and wrapped him in a thermal blanket. Then they loaded him onto the helicopter, which had managed to land in the tight confines of the parking area at the public access, and they lifted off. It was over, and we were amazed and relieved to know that although he wasn’t communicating, after twenty minutes in the water, this man could stand by himself. We felt sure that he would be fine.

And he was. The next day’s paper, while they didn’t identify the person, said he had been treated and released that same day. Again, we breathed a sigh of relief and went back to our lives, a little shaken, but amazed at the chain of events that allowed this man to live. If Bob and May hadn’t been out fishing that day, this man would have just vanished without a trace.

Instead, he is on the phone with Bob. We got home from our walk today, and my phone was beeping its “I have a message” song. I listened, tears coming to my eyes to hear a woman introduce herself as the wife of the man who had been out fishing that day. A lifetime resident of Whitefish, she knew someone who knew the secretary at my school, who also grew up in Whitefish, and they put the pieces together to get my phone number. The message, though, was for Bob. Her voice cracked as she said that she just wanted to talk with him—to thank him—for hearing her husband’s calls. As Bob began to tell her the story, her husband, too, got on the phone. He shared what he could remember—and his feeling of terror for the first six or seven minutes when he thought he was alone. Then he heard Bob’s four-wheeler, but began to lose hope again in realizing that it was on the other side of the lake and that his cries could never be heard over the noise of the machine. Then he heard it drive away. Shortly after, he heard the sound of a helicopter. He said he was never so glad to hear those rotors. He began to relax as he knew then he would be okay.

Bob gave the couple the name and phone number of fisherman Bob—the real reason this man was alive today—and they said they would certainly call him as well. And then the guy said, sheepishly, how embarrassed he was to have done something so foolish. “Well let me tell you,” Bob began, “I took a ride in that same helicopter not too long ago…”--and briefly told him the story. It turns out, they were both rescued from their foolishness by the same angel. As the helicopter crew was at work, Bob recognized the flight nurse—the same nurse who had flown in to his rescue almost two years ago. He couldn’t talk to her in the heat of the moment, or over the noise of the rotor, but he recognized her from the photos he received after his accident.

So, life will return to normal for everyone involved. It’s strange how things happen. It must have been time for another little reminder that human beings should do what we can for each other, and appreciate our lives each and every day.

*Note: the hyperlink is to the best article I have ever read on hypothermia from a 1997 article in Outside Magazine.


Now that you have read the "official version", here's what really happened....













Final word of caution: ladders may not work as well as you have been led to believe for rescuing people on thin ice.