Rescuers get creative during dramatic moose rescue from icy New York lake

Forest rangers and conversation officers in New York describe how they managed a creative water rescue after a moose fell through the ice on a lake.

Forest rangers and conservation officers in New York recently rescued a moose that fell through the ice into Lake Abanakee. In a new video posted on Facebook, describe how they managed the creative rescue without any "training manual."

The New York Department of Environmental conservation said forest rangers and Environmental Conservation Police officers responded to Lake Abanakee in the town of Indian Lake on Jan. 16 after a person saw the moose go into the lake at around 11 a.m. and reported it. They arrived to find the moose in the lake about 100 yards from shore, surrounded by ice and unable to get out.

"It was good that we knew when the moose went in and we knew that time wasn't on our side, but it wasn't going to take forever for us to do what we had to do," Forest Ranger Evan Nahor said in a video released Tuesday.

"We came up with a game plan to say, 'hey, let's see if we can start cutting the channel and see if we can get this moose out of there," said Environmental Conservation Police Lt. Robert Higgins, who humorously noted there's "no training manual for getting moose out of the ice."

The video shows rescuers cutting a long path through the ice with a chainsaw.

"We all knew our role and we were all working together and we were able to cut that path and get the ice out of the way and just move pretty seamlessly," said Forest Ranger Matt Savarie.

Once the path was clear, Nahor and Savarie, dressed in cold-water rescue gear, used sleds to coax the moose along the path. Despite having spent around two hours in the frigid water, the moose was able to climb onto shore on its own. The animal took a a few attempts to stand up before regaining its strength. Once upright on shore, the moose simply wandered back into the woods.

Reporting by TMX

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