Brian Brown saved John P. Boldt and Douglas J. Levean from exposure, Baysville, Ontario, March 9, 2002. At night, Boldt, 64, and his friend, Levean, 61, were ice fishing from a hut on Lake of Bays several hundred feet from shore. It had been raining, and deteriorating weather conditions brought sleet and gale-force winds with gusts of more than 50 m.p.h. Their hut blowing across the ice, Boldt and Levean jumped from it at separate points and lost contact with each other. Rainwater that was pooled atop the ice made footing against the wind impossible. Boldt crawled slowly and with difficulty toward shore, using a chisel to anchor himself to the ice as he rested, and, with equal difficulty, Levean crawled toward the opposite shore. Both men had flashlights with them. Another ice fisherman, Brown, 48, lift truck driver, was at his anchored hut on the lake in that vicinity when he decided to return to shore because of the storm. After retrieving his all-terrain vehicle, which had blown away from the hut, he saw a light in the distance downwind and concluded that it marked a person. Brown drove about 450 feet to Boldt, struggling en route to maintain control of the vehicle in the wind as he steered to avoid fishing holes in the ice. Boldt boarded the vehicle, and as Brown drove to shore he saw the dim light from Levean’s flashlight. After settling Boldt on shore, Brown returned onto the lake, but in a borrowed snowmobile, which afforded better traction. He drove to Levean, who was much farther out than Boldt had been, then took him aboard and returned him to shore. Boldt and Levean were treated at the scene for exposure to the cold, and they recovered.
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