vlad.tribnet.com / Issue #159 / Special reports / Reading article...

Last March a watcher posted in a car near the Okean Restaurant spotted them, 13 ice fishermen adrift on a floe that had broken off and was moving toward the Sea of Japan.

He radioed the Sanatornaya Rescue Station for help, and Capt. Valery Pris — a rough-hewn man in a camouflage uniform and oversized fur hat — fired up the 120-horsepower Gepard hydrofoil and raced out to save the men from the ice.

Pris is one of 14 rescuers stationed at Sanatornaya and dozens throughout the krai who spend their time responding to accidents at sea, most often, from December through March, involving ice fishermen. When the ice thaws in the spring, the rescuers tend to chase down men adrift on thin ice, sometimes standing on a floe knee-deep in water. At this time of year, when pools of water remain in the center, rescues can involve individuals who venture out too far.

“They go through the ice and end up propped on their elbows on the edges of the ice,” said station chief Vladimir Kiselyov. “They hang onto the edges of the ice, and the boat comes and picks them up.”

The rescuers often find themselves dealing with cars. There is no charge for saving a human life, but they will send a bill if asked to hook a cable to a bumper so the owner can tow out the car.

Cars tend to go through the ice when people venture out too late or too early in the season. Sometimes when the ice grows thick, truckers take a shortcut to the other side of the bay. In 1977, a bus full of miners drove across the ice to a favorite fishing spot. The bus hit thin ice and went through. Seventeen men drowned; only the driver escaped.

Like seemingly every public agency in Russia, the rescue service is strapped for cash. Kiselyov wants to buy a larger Puma hydrofoil that would seat 16 people. The cost is $150,000, but so far the krai, which supervises the service, hasn’t come up with the money.

If he could get the larger hydrofoil, Kiselyov can imagine other uses for it. He could take tourists on trips during down times, allowing the rescuers to make a little cash to run their station and pay the employees’ salaries.

When Capt. Pris approached the ice floe last spring, he slowed his hydrofoil, which looks something like a toad in a miniskirt. It is risky to pull right up beside a crowded floe; the fishermen are liable to swarm onto the craft in their panic to escape. Thus he hollered from a distance, giving instructions on how they should proceed.

When he finally reached the ice, the 13 fishermen were ready to do anything he said in order to get off. They had been drifting for three hours. Two of them were suffering from severe hypothermia. Most of the men would have to hold onto the outside rails of the boat to get back.

“Nobody could even say a word,” Pris said. “I told them to clutch onto the rails, and don’t let go of it no matter what happens, because if you lose a hold, you’ll sink like a stone.”

By the time he got back to shore, two men were dead. Rescuers rushed the others into the station, where medics rubbed them down and warmed them until an ambulance arrived. One might think that a fisherman plucked from near death on the ice would feel a bond of gratitude with his rescuers. Yet no one but sailors has returned to say thanks. “Sailors or pilots who have been in peril on a ship and know what it’s like to be in danger, they come,” Pris said. “Most people just run away, because they think we will charge them.”