BC Hydro has released video of one of its crews rescuing a young deer from an icy lake near Vernon, B.C. Wednesday.
"We just happened to look off to the side, and my partner Rob Asplin saw the head of a deer sticking out of the water," said Ken Finlayson, a security and investigations advisor with BC Hydro who was working near Okanagan Lake.
"We went back and had a look through the binoculars – obviously it was having a lot of difficulty in the water."
Finlayson and Aslpin then backtracked to get help from crew members on a nearby barge.
Members of BC Hydro, Okanagan Pile Driving and Mike V's Automotive worked together using two boats—one as an ice-breaker and the other to scoop the deer out of the icy water.
They first tried to pull the deer to a shallower part of the lake in hopes it could make it to shore on its own, but the animal was too weak.
"She was so cold," said Chris Burton of Okanagan Pile Driving. "Even after we got her to shore, we were worried that she wasn’t going to make it."
Once out of the water, Finlayson and Aslpin wrapped the deer in blankets before resuming their work.
"We talked about how we could stay and watch the thing covered up in blankets, but it was obviously stressed that we were there,” said Finlayson, "so we placed it in bush, with some branches and a blanket underneath, and a blanket on top, and went about our business."
By the next morning, the animal had made a full recovery.
"You can't just leave the poor animal to suffer and perish if you have the capability to help out. There's no way we were going to leave it without trying to get hold of these guys on the barge," Finlayson said.
BC Hydro crew helps rescue deer from icy Okanagan LakeA young deer that fell through ice into Okanagan Lake near Vernon on Wednesday was rescued by a handful of men, including BC Hydro crew members, who came together on land and water to play the collective hero. Full story: http://ow.ly/h4Dz30iJ8Vx ��️: with footage from Okanagan Pile Driving
Posted by BC Hydro on Friday, March 2, 2018
