Crowd Can Only Watch Moose Die On-Lookers Helpless To Stop Nature’s Tragedy On Ice

A young bull moose and its mother crashed through the ice on Lake Pend Oreille and struggled for their lives Monday as hordes of distraught people watched.

The trapped 800-pound cow drowned, exhausted after flailing in the icy water more than two hours. The bull moose stood nearby and watched before rumbling through the ice as an Idaho Fish and Game boat arrived to help.

“It’s a damn crime you let them out there that long,” an angry man hollered at a police officer.

After several tries, Fish and Game officers lassoed the surviving moose. They held its snout above water with their hands and pulled it out of the ice. The thick-furred creature finally swam to shore, shook the water out of its coat and munched on a willow tree behind a condominium complex.

“He’s stressed pretty bad. If people leave him alone he might survive,” said Fish and Game officer Don Carr.

The saga began just before 9 a.m. and residents were outraged it took hours before someone helped the struggling animals.

“If I had a boat I would go out there and do it myself,” said Vern Schock as he stood on the shore. “If he dies being drug out of there it’s better than watching him struggle.”

The moose went onto the lake near downtown Sandpoint. Hundreds of passers-by on U.S. Highway 95 watched as the cow raised up its hooves to smash ice and then fell back into the 9-foot-deep water.

Car after car stopped to tell a parked police officer about the trapped moose, including one woman who was nearly in tears.

“It’s terrible,” she said. “You would think someone has a boat and could go out and help them.”

Authorities had to patrol the Long Bridge to keep gawking motorists from blocking traffic. A group of 10 people stood on the bridge yelling encouragement to the sinking moose. “Come on, come on, you can do it,” they screamed, trying to encourage the moose to swim to open water.

Other residents donned binoculars and lined the shore.

“It was very distressing to watch,” said Erica Glickenhaus, as she peered for hours through the window of her lakefront home.

“Just as the boat was coming we saw the moose put it’s head down in the water and die. I was screaming. I was so mad the boat didn’t get there sooner,” she said. “It’s frustrating when it happens in your own back yard.”

The Bonner County Sheriff’s Department received dozens of calls but did not have any boats in the water. Others tried unsuccessfully to chip a boat from the ice at Sandpoint Marina.

“They (authorities) should have a boat ready to go out there,” Glickenhaus said. “What if that was a person out there?”

Fish and Game officials finally arrived with a boat heavy enough to break the ice. It was docked in Hope, about 25 miles away.

“This couldn’t have happened in a worse place. It’s where everyone can see it,” said conservation officer Carr. “People are upset, but we can’t put someone’s life at risk over this. It’s a part of nature and happens all the time.”

More deer fall through the ice and drown than are taken by hunters at Priest Lake, Carr said. He hoped the moose might free itself and feared a boat would spook the other moose into the water.

In fact, one watcher said that’s what happened when the boat finally arrived.

“The other moose headed toward the boat like it was going to defend the body of its dead companion. That’s when it fell through the ice,” said Guy Bailey. He watched with binoculars from his condominium.

The moose wandered into town early Monday trying to escape the deep snow in the forest. Bailey, who just moved to Sandpoint from the Oregon coast, was writing a Christmas letter to friends telling them about Idaho when he saw the moose grazing in his backyard.

“The exhilaration of seeing two moose turned to a tragic sad feeling after watching the one struggle and struggle and then give up. It’s very sad,” he said.

Bailey thought people with cameras scared the moose onto the lake. He watched the cow lay down to rest on the ice. When she tried to get up, the weight on her front legs punched through the ice, Bailey said.

After freeing the bull moose, Carr and another officer boated back to the dead cow and towed her body to City Beach. The animal was hauled away and the meat will be donated to the food bank.

“People have to remember these are wild animals and we did all we could as fast as we could,” Carr said.

, DataTimes