Pat Dollard | Young Americans

OAK HARBOR, Ohio – One person who was among those stuck Saturday on a miles-wide slab of ice that floated away from the Ohio shoreline of Lake Erie has died, while more than 100 others were rescued, authorities said.

(Ice fishermen Gary Vaughn, left, of Pennsylvania, and David Hudzinski, from Wisconsin, make a phone call after being rescued from the ice at Crane Creek Park in Oak Harbor, Ohio.)

The victim fell into the water while searching with others for a link to the shoreline, Ottawa County sheriff Bob Bratton said. Others tried CPR before the person was flown to a hospital and pronounced dead, Bratton said.

Several ships and helicopters from Toledo and Marblehead, and from Detroit, were sent to rescue the people from the 8-mile-wide ice floe. He said 100 to 125 were rescued by late afternoon.

Authorities said fishermen apparently used wooden pallets to create a bridge over a crack in the ice so they could go farther out on the lake Saturday morning. But the planks fell into the water when the ice shifted, stranding the fishermen about 1,000 yards off shore.

Ice on western sections of Lake Erie is up to 2 feet thick, National Weather Service meteorologist Bill Randel said. He said it started to crack as temperatures rose above freezing this weekend and wind gusting to 35 mph pushed on the ice.

“The ice just separated and we didn’t even know,” Rich Strickland of Bowling Green, who was among those rescued, told the Port Clinton News Herald.

Mike Sanger of Milwaukee was in the area for walleye fishing.

“We were having a good time and when it got to be time to come home, it wasn’t so good,” he told the newspaper after being rescued.

Ice fisherman who regularly visit the lake have said this winter’s thick ice has lured more people to the lake this year.

“There was a heck of a city out there for the last week and a half, two weeks,” said 71-year-old Oak Harbor resident Peter Harrison, who has lived on the shore for 40 years.

Ohio Division of Wildlife spokeswoman Jamey Graham said the state annually warns fishermen that there’s no such thing as “safe ice.”

Even in very cold weather, the ice on western Lake Erie is often unsafe because currents can easily cause the ice to shift. Firefighters in communities along the lake are trained for rescues from the ice and are often on guard when temperatures rise.
(AP)

Cleveland Plain Dealer:

by Michael Sangiacomo

OAK HARBOR — Helicopters and boats are working to rescue hundreds of fishermen stranded on an ice floe that broke free west of Sandusky, authorities said.

Rescue units from Cleveland to Detroit have been dispatched. The ice floe broke free about 10:45 a.m, near Crane Creek State Park, near the Davis Besse nuclear power plant in Ottawa County, authorities said.

“We have begun to move some of the people,” said Coast Guard Petty Officer Bill Colclough. “We’re doing everything we can to get to the people.”

Police and fire units from dozens of municipalities, as well as the Canadian Coast Guard, have joined in rescue efforts. There are no reports of injuries at this time.

Unprecendented numbers of fishermen have taken to the ice this winter, as thicker ice allowed fishermen to go further out onto the lake. But today’s unseasonably high temperatures appear to have caused chunks of ice to melt.

FOX Toledo:

by BARRETT ANDREWS
WUPW - Update: One fisherman fell through the ice but was pulled out of the water. Emergency crews were performing CPR before he was taken to Firelands Regional Medical center.

About 200 ice fishermen are stuck on an ice floe, stretching from the Metzger Marsh area to Crane Creek State Park, Ottawa County Sheriff Bob Bratton told FOX Toledo News.

That number is tough to confirm, though, because the people aren’t staying in one place, he said. Some of the stranded are actually making a 10-mile walk to the Camp Perry area in Port Clinton to make it across more solid ice and back to land.

The fishermen had laid down plywood planks on the thin layer of ice to get out to the lake, but the ice melted and sunk their wooden path back to shore, other emergency officials said.

A Promedica Air medical helicopter flew to the scene to help with aerial surveillance, reporting over 100 people and several vehicles on the ice in several different clusters.

Toledo and Washington Township fire departments, the latter equipped with two rescue hovercraft, are also reportledly assisting Jerusalem Township in the rescue efforts.