Bad Ice Story

[Yooperdad]

You guys be careful down there. Just got this email at the office yesterday. Mike

Subject: Eye Opening Story

To: [email protected]

CC: [email protected]

Melissa Voorheis (Wife of Craig Voorheis ,Midmichigan Council Rep. to the MSA Board of Directors) Went into the Bay Near Whites Beach On Sat the 13th at night . Apparently a area around 1/8th mile wide and ¼ mile long opened up that afternoon . She spent nearly an hour in the water and almost died due to Hypothermia .The Attachment is an account of what happened . I have sent a copy of this to Jim Dicky already . You may send this to the board members if you wish .

They tried to find the sled Tuesday but could not locate it . They finally retrieved the sled on Friday the 19th , I hope to be getting pictures soon on this .

Hello everyone,

I wanted to let everyone know that I was involved in a snowmobile accident Saturday evening. I was riding on the Saginaw Bay with 4 other people and it was dark out. We came across open water but were unable to see it till it was too late. The other 4 people I was with made it across but I was unable to. My sled and I went down in a large area of open water, approximately 1/8 to 1/4 mile wide and approximately a mile offshore, were later told that it had just opened up that day. Because of the weak ice around the open water and how large of an area it was, no one could get anywhere near me. The only communication I had with them is us yelling at each other so that they would know I was still ok. 911 were called and they were able to triangulate our location through GPS on cell phones. Coast Guard was dispatched through Bay City on an air boat but because on the rough ice and snow conditions, they were only able to travel at a slow speed. The only air support is in Detroit and was estimated at a 45 min travel time. Local fire and rescue arrived very quickly but did not have the equipment needed for a rescue. I was lucky that a man living on shore, Jerry, used his and his son’s sleds and small aluminum boat to aid in my rescue.

When I first entered the water, I immediately began planning what I was going to do to survive. I wanted to get anything heavy off so it would not pull me under water. I took off my helmet and gloves and was working on getting my boots off when I realized that my helmet was floating. I emptied the water out of it and then put the neck opening into the water, trapping the air inside it. This only was enough to keep me mostly floating. I continued to try to get my boots off and when one came off it popped to the surface. I emptied the water out of the boot and trapped air inside of it and used this as a second floatation device. Later I did the same thing with my other boot. By this time everyone else had made it to solid ice and knew I was in trouble. We yelled back and forth for the comfort of knowing I was still ok. I wanted to swim to ice but it was far enough away that I could not see it so I started just kicking in the direction of the voices. After some time I finally located a large body of broken ice chunks. When I got to them I was pulled in between some of the pieces. They ranged in size from a couple feet wide to several feet wide. I was getting banged up and needed to get out of them for fear of being crushed. I was able to get to the outside but could not pull myself up on any. They were smooth as glass and I had nothing to grip on to. I kept moving along and finally found one that was snowy and rough. I knew I couldn’t pull myself onto it as I was too weak at this point. I had lost all use of my hands and had very little use of my arms and legs. I continued to stay next to that piece of ice.

I was forced to make the decision to abandon my boot and helmet, I had already lost one boot, because I could no longer hold on to them and without them I would go under. My fingers would not bend and were relatively straight so I used them as chisels to create holes in the ice so I could slide them in and anchor myself to the ice. Every once in a while my right hand would slide out of the hole and I would use my chin to grab the ice until I could get my fingers back into the hole. By this time I had lost my vision due to my body shutting down, I could only see light but no shapes. I asked Craig and my friends to show me a light so I’d know where they were. Craig used his cell phone so I could see where they were. Eventually I lost consciousness. I came to when a man was yelling that he had a rope around me. Two firefighters had crossed from ice chunk to ice chunk to get close to me. They had thrown a rope around me and put a ladder next to me. They needed me to climb on the ladder because they couldn’t get to me. They kept telling me I had to get on the ladder but it was so painful I couldn’t move, I told them I couldn’t. I finally used every last once of willpower I had left and made it on to the ladder. It was so painful I was screaming. From that point on I was mostly unconscious. I remember very little and only a piece here and there.

I have been told that they used the ladder to slide me across the broken ice. The aluminum boat was pushed over to them and they put me inside and pulled it to where the snowmobiles were sitting. Craig, the firefighters, and my friends took their coats off and covered me with them and they towed me to the ambulance. I was driven by ambulance to Bay Medical where a team was waiting for me. My core body temp was down to 85 and I have been told that 86 is when complete body shut down usually occurs. I had a wonderful team of people who worked on me to get my vitals back up, then was transferred to ICU for the night. There was much concern that I would go into cardiac arrest from the severe hypothermia. Luckily that did not happen.

My hand are cut and bruised and I broke off most of my nails very low do to digging in the ice. They are extremely sensitive and somewhat painful but it does not look like I have any frostbite. My arms, chest, and back are bruised from the ice chunks but other than that, physically, I am in good condition.

I’m sorry to send this out in an email but I’m a little emotional right now and am having a hard time telling the story to people. I didn’t want anyone to find out through word of mouth and thought this was the best option.

I love you all.

Melissa

Bill Manson

Executive Director

Michigan Snowmobile Association

616-301-2743

[2UNREEL]

Amazing story, very inspirational. Never give up.

[fishsniffer2]

Amazing what the human body can do when pushed to the limits. Thanks for sharing the story and glad the ending was a happy one!

[Adam Bomb]

Yup read that a week ago. Thats always a bad area. Nothing to hold the ice up there. Usually bad cracks to contend with. I normally steer clear of there. Thanks for the link, im sure someone will find it very useful.