{"id":9853,"date":"2024-01-17T13:42:20","date_gmt":"2024-01-17T13:42:20","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","slug":"New-London-firefighters-rescue-deer-fallen-through-ice-53729437\/","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/?p=9853","title":{"rendered":"Oh, deer!: Upper Valley doe rescue illustrates hazards of thin ice"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"A
A doe that had fallen through the ice on Pleasant Lake in New London on Sunday morning was rescued by the New London Fire Department.<\/figcaption><\/figure>
\"New
New London firefighter Max Isley arrives at the shorre of Pleasant Lake with a rescued doe that had fallen through the ice on Sunday morning.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/figure>

NEW LONDON \u2014 The New London Fire Department was on thin ice Sunday morning when it rescued a partially submerged deer from Pleasant Lake.<\/p>\n

Just before 7:30 a.m., with temperatures around freezing, the Fire Department received an emergency call from a Lakeshore Drive resident. A doe, about 300 feet from shore, was unable to pull herself back onto the fragile ice, of less than an inch thick, that she\u2019d fallen through.<\/p>\n

Firefighters Max Isley and Andrew Sarnevitz gingerly made their way out to the doe, tethered to shore by a rope. They hauled the deer out onto an \u201cice sled,\u201d which evenly distributed her weight, and pulled her back to land.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe deer was sort of flailing around, but as soon as (Andrew) put his arms around her, she stopped struggling,\u201d Fire Chief Jason Lyon said.<\/p>\n

While the distressed animal was certainly in need of assistance, the rescue was less of \u201can emergency operation,\u201d Lyon said, than a \u201cphenomenal training\u201d opportunity.<\/p>\n

It was colder over the weekend than it had been in the ones preceding it, but that did little to stabilize much of Pleasant Lake.<\/p>\n

Ice builds up gradually, so it matters where the mercury has been landing in the recent past. This winter, \u201cwe\u2019ve had some conditions that have been below freezing, and then other days that it\u2019s been almost 60 degrees,\u201d Lyon said.<\/p>\n

Plus, the vast expanse of the 600-acre lake \u2014 larger by 200 acres than Little Lake Sunapee \u2014 remains consistently windy, which cuts away at ice thickness.<\/p>\n

Pleasant Lake only froze all the way across last year in the second week of March, the latest in recent memory, he said.<\/p>\n

The New Hampshire Fish and Game Department recommends a minimum of six inches of ice before venturing out onto a water body on foot and between eight and 10 inches for snow machine or all-terrain vehicle travel.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith erratic weather conditions, some areas of ice may look safe but may not be,\u201d said Col. Kevin Jordan, chief of the department\u2019s law enforcement division, in a news release last week. \u201cWe are urging people to check the ice thickness before going out onto any frozen water body.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lyon said he\u2019s noticed people heading out on lakes even while there are still patches of open water. \u201cIt\u2019s crazy,\u201d he said, emphasizing that it endangers \u201cthe rescuers that potentially need to go out and save them.\u201d<\/p>\n

The department responds to one or two ice rescue calls a year, but as temperatures remain inconsistent, Lyon stays on guard.<\/p>\n

He cautioned against staging a rescue without first calling in professional assistance. It\u2019s better to err on the side of ringing up the fire department, \u201cotherwise we have to go get two people who have fallen through ice,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

As for the doe, \u201ca coyote might have chased her out there, or she thought it was just a regular field or whatnot,\u201d Lyon said.<\/p>\n

Once the deer was returned to more solid ground, the firefighters on the scene positioned themselves so she wouldn\u2019t run back onto the ice, perhaps addled by the drama of her morning.<\/p>\n

The responders successfully herded the doe back into the woods, Lyon said. But first \u201cshe gave herself a long shake to dry off,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Frances Mize is a Report for America corps member. She can be reached at fmize@vnews.com or 603-727-3242.<\/em>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NEW LONDON \u2014 The New London Fire Department was on thin ice Sunday morning when it rescued a partially submerged deer from Pleasant Lake.Just before 7:30 a.m., with temperatures around freezing, the Fire Department received an emergency call from a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":198,"featured_media":9854,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":false,"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","_newspack_byline_active":true,"_newspack_byline":"by [Author id=198]Frances Mize[\/Author] Valley News\u00a0","newspack_content_restriction_is_exempt":false,"newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,508],"tags":[24,254,505],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[554],"class_list":["post-9853","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-police-fire-courts","category-top-headlines-cm","tag-facebook","tag-new-london-nh","tag-paywall","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/42712217-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9853","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/198"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9853"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9853\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9855,"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9853\/revisions\/9855"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9854"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9853"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fnewspack_spnsrs_tax&post=9853"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nne-concord-monitor-2.newspackstaging.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=9853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}