There’s something that often compels people to venture out on frozen lakes and rivers that may not hold their body weight: Their beloved pet is on thin ice.

If the unthinkable happens and the ice breaks, emergency responders must employ some special rescue skills. Last week firefighters and other first responders completed their annual ice rescue training along a branch of the Flathead River north of Helena Flats.

“The dominant reason for an ice rescue call is that someone went into the water while trying to rescue a pet,” Kalispell Assistant Fire Chief Jon Campbell said.

With ice rescue, the basic rule is “reach, throw, row and go,” Campbell said. If a victim can be reached and pulled from the water, that is always the first strategy attempted. The next level involves throwing a rope to a victim and seeing if he can hold on and be pulled out.

If the victim is in open water, the strategy is to take a boat out. The fourth and final set of rescue options, the “go” options, are the most dangerous for emergency responders. It is these fourth-tier strategies that the Kalispell crews trained in last week.

There are four evolutions to the ice rescue training, including self-rescue, using an ice awl; rescue without being in the water, using a rope; rescue with the rescuer in the water, tying the rope around the victim; and rescuer in the water, using a backboard and rope.

As a general rule of thumb, ice 2 inches thick will hold one person walking on it. For a group of people, a bare minimum would be ice 4 inches thick.

“Do not go out on ice over moving water, ever,” Campbell stressed.

If a victim goes through the ice over moving water, he is likely to be swept down from the site where he entered and can be difficult or impossible to find in time.

Campbell recommends always using caution when going out onto the ice; go with a partner, bring a rope. He suggests that those going out onto the ice should always cut a test hole to check the ice conditions.

“Ice gets thinner the farther you are from the shore,” Campbell said.