Man who tried to rescue snowmobiler shares story

Randy Thorpe says he and his wife were the first to assist a snowmobiler that broke through the ice Saturday night.

Randy Thorpe says he and his wife were the first to become aware of a man breaking through the ice on his snowmobile Saturday night.

“I was running out onto the lake to try to get the rest of them to stop, because there were a lot more machines coming. It was like a train of snowmobiles,” said Thorpe.

The RCMP underwater recovery team spent much of Monday searching Black River Lake in Nova Scotia’s Annapolis Valley for the missing 26-year-old New Ross man.

Thorpe says there were a dozen snowmobilers driving by, one after the other.

“I mean, they were traveling at a rate of speed, I mean like crazy,” said Thorpe.

He says he saw the first one go down.

“I could look across there and see this guy splashing water in his arms was going in the air, and he was screaming, you know, ‘Help me, help me,’” said Thorpe. “The seat went in first, and then the headlight was going to die up in the air, and then it just gradually went into the lake.”

All were rescued except the 26-year-old man.

“Nobody could get out there because it was so slushy, then there was just thin ice,” said Thorpe. “Enough that some snowmobilers were getting out enough that they could get to their friends, and then they would go through, and it was just chaos.”

The RCMP say the incident is still considered a missing persons investigation.

“While we are continuing our investigation, one component of that investigation is that the male fell through the water and never came out,” said Const. Kelli Gaudet of Kings County RCMP.

As emergency responders remind snowmobilers to make sure they know the area they're travelling in and to proceed with caution, those living in the area say the conditions on the lake are difficult even for the most experienced snowmobilers.

“The water flows through that narrows, it's like a river, right? You don't freeze, but if you get away from that current, off to the side, it gets thick,” said Thorpe

Friends and family of the missing man stood watch as the divers searched. They say they just want to find their friend.

With files from CTV Atlantic’s Kayla Hounsell.