Beware of Ice!

This time of the year is so wonderful; it is nice to feel the warm sun on your skin after a long dark winter. Everyone is out and about enjoying the beautiful weather, the temps are in the comfy 40’s and 50’s, t-shirt weather to most of us, who have acclimated to -20’s and -30’s. The days are longer, it is still bright as day outside at 10:30 at night, and a dusk light till around 12:00 p. m.

We still have to remember to be careful as the weather is nicer, but the temps still drop down below freezing at night or when we get a cloud covering the sun for any time length of over 10 minutes…temps drop quickly, and if you are not dressed properly you will be exposed to the cold and can get hypothermia (An abnormally low body temperature, often caused by prolonged exposure to cold.) which can be deadly!

So it is best if you are dressed in T-Shirt, that you carry a medium weight jacket with you wherever you go in case you need it, the same with extra pants if you are in shorts. Clean dry socks and even extra shoes if you can..

Because even if you are driving somewhere, if your car should break down or you have an accident, things cool off really quickly and everything is really wet and muddy, so if you have to walk anywhere it is best to be prepared.

Also, the snow has melted in most places and things are flooding here and there, but will really be dangerous this next month as the mountain areas start melting and the water drains into the rivers, overflowing in some areas. So we must be aware of flash flooding if we are around any rivers, including fishing.

In addition, most of the lakes are still frozen, it is a sad thing we hear year after year, that someone has gone through the ice on a snow machine, four-wheeler or vehicle, because the ice is soft, and you can’t always tell how soft until too late.

In Alaska it is common to use the ice covered lakes as roadways to reach places you normally would have to boat, or fly to, in summer weather and this time of the year is most dangerous, because the ice still looks safe on the top looking down, but may be weakened from the warmer water underneath, causing a weak spot on the ice which can not hold weight.

Beautiful Frozen lake, Black spots on the lake are from ice fisherman's campfires

Picture by K. Fields

One good rule of thumb to help you to know that it is dangerous is the ice pulls away from the shoreline. Now I know most of you are thinking…well…duh! But when you live here, you tend to get lax on these issues, and take chances.

When ice pulls away from the shoreline, it is a good idea to stay off the ice!

Picture by K. Fields

Another way to tell if the ice is weakened, is if you feet or vehicle leave slushy marks on the top of the ice. This time of the year, that is a sure sign the ice is melting quickly so you should be wise and stay off.

Slushy tracks left on the ice is a sure sign of quickly melting ice…Beware!

Picture by K. Fields

People have lost countless snow machines, vehicles, ATVs, Ice houses-(usually a wooden shack sitting out on the frozen lake, used for sitting inside while fishing from holes drilled through the ice, they even build little campfires on the ice, it is an amazing sight) and sometimes precious lives.

People have fallen through the ice this time of year, and can’t get back out, because they can’t find the hole they fell into, or the ice keeps breaking off as they try and climb out, and they end up with hypothermia and their limbs won’t move anymore and they just sink, and can’t be found until the ice melts, or possibly never, if this happens in a river with water moving underneath dragging them away.

I know this sounds morbid, but this is what happens every year, so I cannot stress enough how important it is to be very cautious on the frozen lakes and streams right now.

CU

Side note:

Right after I finished with this blog I got a phone call from a friend of mine, she is Eskimo and her family lives in Point Hope, they go Whaling this time of year, they use the Whale meat and blubber to survive the winters where they are located. So they are permitted to hunt a certain amount of Whale each year, it is a celebration if they get even one! ( and before all you Whale lovers out there start ranting, you should know that this is just about all they have plus arctic hare, and berries in the summer to survive on all winter. They do not have grocery stores and shopping malls, it is their way of life, their culture and nothing gets wasted...)They harvested a Whale, and many natives were helping to cut it up and prepare for storage, when the ice they were on broke away from the shoreline, and now they and the harvested Whale are drifting out to sea on a sheet of ice. There are rescuers on boats from shore to help, and a helicopter will also be required. This rarely happens where they live, everything is still frozen.