A snowmobile pulled out of Port Huron's Black River Sunday, is a reminder for the public that they may be on thin ice.
The St. Clair County Sheriff's Dive Team responded to a call near the I-94 overpass at 4:15 p.m.
Sheriff Tim Donnellon said while the owner wasn't injured, it was a dangerous recovery for the team with temperatures below -18 C (0 F) with the wind chill at the time.
He said it took two and a half hours for the team to cut a hole into the ice with chainsaws and then send divers 14 feet below the surface and 130 feet from shore to attach a cable from a tow truck.
The snowmobile was then reeled ashore.
Donnellon reminds everyone to practice ice safety this winter and said the general rule is to make sure the ice is at least four inches thick to walk on or ice fish, and at least six inches for a snowmobile.
Sarnia Fire and Rescue Public Education Officer Mike Otis said shelf ice that builds up along the Lake Huron and St. Clair River shoreline also posses a risk.
"The action that forms them, with the water splashing up, also can erode them from underneath," said Otis. "So if you fell through one of those ice mounds, you wouldn't even been seen from shore and it would be a very difficult rescue. So for people who do wander out onto those, it can be a very dangerous situation."
Otis said it's better to safe than sorry and stay away from them.
"If you fall through, you can catch hypothermia very quickly and it's very hard to get back on the ice when your body starts shutting down," said Otis. "When we conduct an ice water rescue, we have a whole team-- we go out in our suits and we have people shore-based with lines reaching out to the rescuers in order to conduct the operation."
Otis said the Sarnia fire department routinely trains in frigid waters to sharpen their ice water rescue skills.
-With files from Colin Gowdy.
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