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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Icy Rescue Effort Poling Skiff Across Thin Ice, Man Saves One Dog But Not Second

Kim Jacklin vowed not to watch people on the ice at Fernan Lake anymore. It makes her too nervous.

Yet, Sunday found Jacklin standing in the snow, field glasses pressed to her eyes, as a neighbor battled his way across the ice to try to save his pets.

Jim Hintz struggled to pole an aluminum skiff over the frosted surface, hoping to rescue a beagle and a German shepherd that had plunged through thin ice in the middle of the half-frozen lake.

The beagle, a 14-year-old named Sally, died before Hintz could reach her. Ten-month-old Rosie, a pregnant German shepherd, survived.

On shore, a worried Debbie Hintz pressed her hands to her face as the beagle’s head disappeared under the water.

“Have you seen Sally yet?” her son called from inside the Hintzes’ home.

“No baby, I think we lost her,” she told the weeping boy.

Out in the lake, her husband pulled Rosie from the water and tied a rope to the beagle’s body.

Kootenai County sheriff’s deputies - worried that Jim Hintz would exhaust himself and not be able to make it back - watched from shore.

Debbie Hintz said the dogs were playing in the snow, then wandered out on the ice.

“It was just an accident,” she said. “We don’t usually let the dogs out together.”

Jim Hintz pushed the boat, with one oarlock broken in the rescue, back to open water and paddled to shore. He straddled the German shepherd, trying to keep her warm.

“Poor, poor doggy,” said neighbor Ron Douglas as deputies pulled the dazed dog from the boat.

“She was in bad shape, freezing and whining,” Jim Hintz said. “The ice was only about an inch-and-a-half thick out there.”

Rescuers struggled to warm up the dog in blankets and a warm truck.

By evening, Hintz said, Rosie was fine.

Throughout the day, ice fishermen huddled around fishing holes on the lake’s far shore. Several watched the rescue effort.

Jacklin shook her head.

“They risk their lives for a few fish,” she said.

, DataTimes