Maine dad dies saving 4-year-old son after both fall through frozen pond

Officials are warning Maine residents about ice safety after a father died saving his son on Friday from a frozen pond. 

On the morning of Jan. 26, Kevin Howell, 51, and his 4-year-old son fell through ice as they were crossing Etna Pond in Carmel, Maine, the Penobscot County Sheriff's Office said in a news release. Howell was able to get his son out of the frozen pond and told him to get his mother, the sheriff's office said.

His son was able to reach their home, 1/3 of a mile from the pond, and inform his mother, according to the sheriff's office. "The mom told the young boy to stay at home, she called 911, and she rushed to help her husband," the sheriff's office said. 

The mother, armed with an anchor and rope, reached the lake and secured the rope to the shore in an attempt to reach her husband but ended up falling into the frozen water, according to the sheriff's office. 

Penobscot Sheriff Detective Jordan Norton, who was in the area and heard the 911 call, spotted Howell's wife in the water and crawled onto the ice, pulling the mother out of the freezing water using the rope, the sheriff's office said. 

But Howell was nowhere to be found, according to the sheriff's office. 

After Norton reunited Howell's wife and son, six Maine Warden Service divers and one State Police diver arrived to assist, the sheriff's office said. 

After 20 minutes of searching, divers located Howell's body, according to the sheriff's office. 

In a separate incident, five people, including three children, were rescued on Saturday after their utility vehicle fell through the ice on Moose Pond in Denmark, Maine, CBS News affiliate WGME 13 reported. 

Officials are now warning Maine residents to be prepared with proper tools, like picks-of-life and ice chisels, before going on ice. 

"These are just items that we carry if we fall through the ice, we can get ourselves out easily and efficiently," Maine Game Warden Emerson Duplissie-Cyr told WGME 13. "Even having an ice chisel like this, just checking the depth of the ice or the thickness of the ice as you go out."

"Continuously checking every few feet, just because where the ice is at one spot can change drastically," he added.