Good evening once again. I have a great one tonight for all of you who live in cold climates. By that I mean climates that are cold enough to permit ice fishing.
So as with most places in the northeast, the Syracuse area has been warmer than normal by roughly 10 degrees. I went to the store earlier and saw a large number of people out on the ice of Oneida Lake fishing. In a normal year I wouldn't think twice about this but just 1 week earlier we had 2 days where it was over 50 surrounded by several days where the temperature was at or near 40 with rain on a couple of them. Again, with the really cold nights I might not think twice about it but...you could clearly see a path in the ice where it was thin, a different color with no snow on it, that ran across the path that the fishermen had to cross. So that tells me that the ice is probably thin.
So some of you may think that it isn't a big deal since they obviously got out there, right? Well what really told me that the ice was too thin was when we went around the west end. For about 1/4 of a mile there was no ice at all on the lake. Not a thin layer that was see through, no ice at all! The wind was making ripples on the water.
The reason I have an issue with this is because it is my tax dollars that will pay for someone's rescue when they fall through. Beyond just my tax dollars, they are putting the rescuers life in danger as well. All this just to go out and freeze to catch a few fish! What are they thinking?
So here is the brilliance of the ice fishermen in the area. Yesterday 2 adults took 6 children out to go ice fishing. Someone on shore noticed the ice breaking with "water gushing up over it" and launched their row boat. That's right, there was enough water to launch a boat and paddle out to assist the people! They were able to save them without anyone getting hurt, but barely...
ReplyDeleteBut, as if that wasn't bad enough, people went out fishing again today even though the overnight temperature was above freezing (near 40). Someone decided to go out to take pictures of the fishermen and fell through. Here is the problem that I have, a trooper attempted to go out to assist the person and fell through himself!
This is just ludicrous! Stop the fishing! Of course, this won't happen unless the DEC gets involved which will cost money which will cause people to complain because taxes or license costs will go up to cover it.