Get off the ice, City yells at over-eager Yellowknifers

The City of Yellowknife gave residents a stern social media talking-to this week, imploring them to keep off thin lake ice.

Some Yellowknifers, apparently just glad Mother Nature has settled on a season, could be seen in weekend photos merrily skating on transparently thin ice around the community.

Each year, the City works with the Great Slave Snowmobile Association to periodically measure ice thickness at a range of sites. The City’s standard advice has always been to wait until ice is six inches thick before venturing out.

Despite this year’s early onset of ice, and despite your understanding of what six inches looks like, no Yellowknife lakes are remotely close yet – so much so, the City hasn’t even bothered to start updating its website with weekly measurements at the time of writing.

When that happens, you can find the weekly updates here each Monday. The City said testing would begin ‘shortly’.

Yellowknife, October 8th, 2018. pic.twitter.com/MA7XMTUy1L

— Loren McGinnis (@LorenMcGinnis) October 8, 2018

“Please stay off the ice,” the City begged residents in a Thanksgiving weekend tweet.

Photos posted to social media showed not only people skating, but even what appeared to be two youths cycling across a frozen lake in recent days.

City officials are concerned for individual residents’ safety but also for the wellbeing of first responders, tasked with attempting to rescue anyone who does fall through thin ice at this time of year.

If you do see anyone in distress, call 873-2222 immediately to summon assistance.