- A 65-year-old man fell into Lake Arbutus near Traverse City, Michigan
- Michigan State Trooper Kammeron Bennetts couldn’t reach the man, so he enlisted his dog, Ruby, to help with the rescue
- A quick-thinking officer used a “rescue disc” attached to Ruby’s necklace to pull the man to safety
A Michigan police officer who was unable to reach a man who fell through the ice on a lake and was running out of time in the frigid water was able to get rescue help from the man’s dog standing on the ice next to its owner.
“Will he come to me? Ruby come here!” Michigan State Trooper Kammeron Bennetts, 30, called out as the Brittany bird hunting dog stood next to a small hole made by her owner, who had come out to check on the ice fishing conditions. . On Thursday, he broke through the ice and dove into Lake Arbutus near Traverse City, he tells PEOPLE.
“I could see him bouncing,” Bennetts said, knowing he had to work fast but could only stand safely 30-40 feet away on the thin ice. “It could be two seconds or two minutes. But once it goes down, it won’t come back up.”
According to his body camera video, the officer first throws out a Frisbee-like rescue disc tied to a rope, but it lands several feet away from the 65-year-old man. Then he asks for the help of the dog, which he calls and tries to make him bite the rope. When she can’t catch him, Bennetts attaches a rope to her collar, then orders the owner to call her.
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Ruby rushes back and splashes into the water, placing the disk in the man’s hands. After pushing Ruby back onto the ice, the man holds on to the disc as Bennetts tells him to kick his feet to bring his feet to the surface. Bennetts and Grand Traverse Subway firefighters then pull on the rope until they are able to pull the man out of an estimated 8-10 feet of water, onto the ice and eventually to shore where he was able to walk to an ambulance.
The man, who did not want to comment, was taken to a hospital for treatment and then released, according to Michigan State Police Lt. Derrick Carroll.
Bennetts, who has been on the force for two years, said training and instinct took over. He was several miles away when bystanders called 911 to report the incident and arrived to find the lake with a thin layer of “spongy” ice covered with about a foot of snow on top.
He was trained in water and ice rescue and was himself under ice-cold water during diving training for about five minutes. “Within a minute your dexterity in your fingers is gone, you lose your speech, you lose everything,” he said.
Officer Kammeron Bennetts.
Courtesy of Kammeron Bennetts
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With an air temperature of about 18 degrees and a surface water temperature of about 30 degrees, the man was in the water for about 16 minutes and was in a precarious situation, he said.
“They go under the ice,” Bennetts said. “That doesn’t happen very often where we have a successful rescue.”
Bennetts, who owns a bird hunting dog, a German Shorthaired Pointer named Tanner, said he relied on his training and knowledge of dogs during the rescue.
“Go back to the tools in front of you. I only had the dog in front of me, so use the dog,” he said. – I saw that she was ready to go to work.
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Bennetts said the man thanked him afterward. “I said, ‘You better give the dog a ribeye.'” The man said he would reward Ruby with her favorite activity. “He said, ‘I’m going to take her outside and go hunting.'”
Lt. Carroll said Bennetts’ actions were greatly appreciated. “Everyone is impressed with (his) ability to take control of the situation and his ability to think outside the box to save a man in such a timely manner.”
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