April 8, 2019 at 3:35 p.m.
Pelican Lake couple thanks firefighters for blizzard rescue
Pelican Lake couple thanks firefighters for blizzard rescue
The Davises, who recently purchased a home in Pelican Lake, had been trying to get out on their sleds for days, but life did not cooperate.
Finally, on the 24th, the couple decided to take their snowmobiles to a BP station on Highway 45. However, Old Man Winter had other plans for them.
"It was just that one day, that blizzard day," Guy Davis said. "And we had wanted to go out and go snowmobiling Friday and Saturday, but we couldn't do it. We were too busy, we were tied up with other commitments, then we decided to go out on the worst day in 20 years. So we did."
It didn't take long for the Davises to realize they were in very serious trouble.
The barrels that lead the way to the gas station weren't visible in the heavy snow and the wind was whipping at about 45 miles per hour.
"It was just a whiteout; you couldn't see more than 10 feet in front of you," Davis said. "And I said, 'let's turn around and go home,' and (Theresa) says 'no, let's go get the gas.' Because we had been to the gas station several times when it wasn't those conditions, so I said 'follow me, stay right behind me.' Well, she started going toward the shore, because if she was going to get stuck, she was going to get stuck where she could walk to the shore."
That might have been a valid plan from where they started, where the snow was only a couple of feet deep, but as they approached the eastern shoreline the snow was getting deeper.
"By the time she got over by shore, it was 3 or 4 feet deep," Davis said. "I made it to the gas station. I looked back and she wasn't there."
Retracing his own tracks, which were rapidly being covered by new snow, Guy spotted Theresa's sled.
"It was on its side and half buried already," Davis said. "And I had only been five or 10 minutes at the most."
He maneuvered his sled near hers, but was worried about getting too close and getting stuck himself. So he started walking toward her.
"And I had just had my knees replaced two years ago, and I had a blood clot about two months before that," Davis said. "I'm praying to God, I said 'if I have to die trying to save my wife, so be it,' and I started maybe a 50-yard trek to get to her, and it took everything I had to get to her."
The snow was rapidly piling up, to the point where Theresa could not get her feet out and walk to her husband's sled.
"I actually had to pick my feet up and take step-by-step," Guy said. "When I finally got to her, I didn't really have a clue what we were going to do, because I didn't have enough in me to make it to shore and she couldn't make it to shore."
Theresa, however, had already used her cellphone to call 9-1-1.
All they had to do was hang tight and wait for help.
"It was maybe about a half hour before dark and (the Pelican Lake Fire District) got us out, and I said 'could you maybe tag the sled and pull that a little bit so I could get the sled out?' And they really didn't have to do that, all they had to do was get us out, it's not a priority to get your toys out; it's to get you out."
They got Theresa's sled to the BP, after tugging it out of the snow using a crawler.
With the weather forecast for the next day featuring a high of -5-degrees, Davis asked if there was any chance they could go back for his sled. One of the five firefighters in the rescue party said if it was his sled they would want to go get it, Davis recalled.
So they took the tracked vehicle back out into the blizzard.
"By this time it had been another half hour and it had blown even further and my sled was buried," Davis said. "And they said no, it's too much slush, it's too much of a risk, we're going to have to leave it there. And all the way back, I was grateful that I even got out of there myself, let alone the sled."
Davis was even more grateful two weeks later when he discovered that he had a 90-percent blockage in one of the arteries in his heart and needed a stent.
He believes he would have died of a heart attack on the lake if he had continued trying to free his wife from the snow. She also may have perished in the blizzard, he added.
On April 1, the couple attended a Pelican Lake town meeting to present their rescuers with a plaque, along with a few adult beverages for good measure.
Davis said that was to make up for not thinking to offer them a beer the night of the rescue.
"I started thinking about it; it was dark by the time we got out of there," he said Monday evening. "So I brought a couple cases tonight."
PLFD Chief Wayne Sparks noted that the tracked vehicle and trailer used to rescue the Davises was paid for entirely by donations.
"I was never more happy then when I saw them coming on that," Davis said.
Jamie Taylor may be reached via email at [email protected].
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