Rice County Sheriff Advises Keeping Vehicles Off Area Lakes

Rice County Sheriff Troy Dunn recently issued an advisory recommending people keep their vehicles off the lakes.

Dunn told KDHL/Power 96 Radio it takes his deputies about 30 minutes to get to the scene, "so time is not on your side if you go through that ice."

He says a fishing tournament scheduled for this weekend on Lake Mazaska has been canceled for safety reasons.

Dunn encourages people to be equipped if they do go out with the "tools needed like ice picks, float coat or some personal flotation device."

KDHL/Power 96 asked the sheriff if he considered implementing a ban of vehicles on the lakes in Rice County and he replied, "We talked about it but then you know, it really comes down to enforcement then and I have to send people out on the ice to cite people. People just need to use common sense and make good decisions on their own."

He went on to say, "I'm just going to go with the advisory that the ice is not safe and don't put yourself in those places."

We're not far from the requirement for the fish houses to be off area lakes anyway and Dunn said he did see a lot of people pull their "fish houses off lakes this past weekend, and I think it's a good idea because if you can't get out there and they go through then you're going to be responsible for recovery with the DNR."

Dunn also used the opportunity to remind people to slow down on area roads in the morning, saying with the "refreezing that's occurring at night we're having a few crashes in the morning because people are going too fast for the conditions. So usually if you have to scrape ice off your windows you're probably going to see the same effect on the roads, so make sure you slow down and drive for the conditions cause we've had a number of crashes the past couple mornings."