Rescued 1 day, fishing the next

PORT CLINTON, Ohio (AP) — Many of the 134 fishermen rescued from Lake Erie ice returned to the miles-long floe Sunday using rented air boats to retrieve left-behind snowmobiles, all-terrain vehicles and other equipment. A few ventured onto the risky ice to fish for walleye.

About 300 fishermen were stationed on stable ice not far from where the crack had opened Saturday, stranding the anglers about 1,000 yards from the Ohio shoreline.

“[The ice] is an honest 14 inches,” veteran fisherman Pat Chrysler of Put-In-Bay told The Plain Dealer in a telephone interview Sunday from South Bass Island. “I measured it with a Stanley tape measure, just to be accurate.”

A Coast Guard helicopter surveyed how much abandoned equipment remained on the ice, but fishermen were responsible for recovering their own belongings, said Petty Officer William Mitchell, a Coast Guard spokesman.