93.9 The Eagle – The News and Talk of Columbia, MO
A wrestler at Columbia’s Fr. Tolton high school and his mother are credited with saving the life of a man who fell through the ice at Cedar Lake, near Rock Bridge high school.
The incident happened in February, when a man dressed in just shorts and a t-shirt fell through ice, while trying the save his dog. Michelle Ankenman, the nurse at Our Lady of Lourdes school, heard an unusual sound that afternoon, and saw the dog running near the shore line.
“I stepped out a little bit further and I saw a hole in the ice and the dog was wet, so I was like oh my gosh the dog had fallen through the ice. And then I heard this sound again and I couldn’t see anything and I kind of stepped off to the side because we have some trees in our backyard. And when I stepped to the side, I saw a second hole with a man in the hole in the ice … who, he was not really able to speak at that point,” Ankenman tells 939 the Eagle.
She ran inside to tell her son Christopher, a 15-year-old who was dressed in pajamas while doing homework.
“I remember running down, I was going to look for a rope and my mom pointed out the hose. So I run, grab this metal elastic hose and we run down to the shore side and I kind of threw it out, missed the first time he seems to be a bit farther out. And then threw it again, got it to him. And he grabbed on, we just pulled him in,” Christopher says.
Christopher, a Tolton wrestler, tells 939 the Eagle that he didn’t have time to put a coat on. The man was in the icy water for 15 minutes. The Ankenman’s say he was blue and purple and had gashes on his chest from trying to pull himself from the ice. Michelle says it took 12 hours to get his temperature back to normal.
Ms. Ankenman tells 939 the Eagle that she feels that God put the man in her sight at the right moment and gave her and her son Christopher the ability to think clearly and to act quickly.
