Child killed, another recovering after falling through ice at Kennesaw lake

KENNESAW, Ga - Authorities say one of two children pulled from a small Kennesaw lake after attempting to walk across the ice has died.

Ellison Lake is located off Ellison Lakes Drive near Cobb Parkway NW. It is bordered by the Park at Kennesaw and Lakeside Vista apartment homes.

Shortly before 5 p.m., residents reported seeing about a half-dozen children playing near the south side of the lake just off a trail that runs beside it. Alex Pollard says he was bringing groceries in when he noticed the children.

"There's about five kids playing out on the ice, three are along the bank shore," Pollard described.

One child was about feet from the bank and a second child was about 10 feet over the water.

"It looked pretty sturdy at first, so I didn't think much of it," Pollard said, adding that the pond doesn’t appear that deep at that end.

Moments later, neighbors would report hearing screams. The two children had fallen through the ice. Pollard yelled for his roommate to call 911.

"We see two kids trapped in the ice, one of the kids was holding on to the other one," Pollard said.

The first on the scene were officers with the Kennesaw Police Department.

"Kennesaw PD was here initially and was able to rescue one of them," said Cobb County Fire Department spokesperson Nick Danz.

Video shared with FOX 5 shows at least one officers around the ice.

Officers were able to pull one of the children out safely. He was taken to an area hospital, but is expected to survive.

Attention quickly turned to the second child.

"There were bystanders here trying to toss out a hose, a [pool] noodle, different flotation devices," Danz said.

Firefighters were quickly able to deploy inflatable boats. Rescuers called in the Georgia State Patrol helicopter and a drone unit, both utilizing thermal imaging to try to find the child.

"All the tools we had, we were utilizing," Danz said.

SKYFOX 5 around 6:30 p.m. flew over the scene where dozens of police and rescue vehicles were lined along the lake. Fire crews were seen launching a boat into the water. Fire officials say they used whatever they could to break up the ice to get to the second child.

The second child, identified only as a 16-year-old man, was found around 6:50 p.m. and pulled from the lake. Emergency crews began efforts to resuscitate them as they were rushed to an area hospital. Despite the efforts of the rescue crews, the child did not survive.

The named and ages of the children were not released.

"After I had seen how serious it had gotten, it really hit me, this stuff really doesn't happen in Georgia too often," Pollard said.

Three members of Cobb Fire were treated for cold exposure that they suffered when they entered the freezing water to try and rescue the second victim. Officials estimate firefighters were in the water for about an hour and 20 minutes. One was taken to the hospital. Another firefighter was treated for cuts and scrapes.

Firefighters say the surface temperature of the lake was 28 degrees.

FOX 5 Storm Team Chief Meteorologist David Chandley says about 60 hours of subfreezing temperatures were recorded from Friday to Christmas Day at nearby McCollum Field, but it would be hard to gauge how thick the ice would be on the lake. The warm-up the past few days would also make any lake ice unstable to walk upon at this point.

"It's not normal temperatures for our area, so we just remind people that it's not safe to go out on any body of water or trust the ice on any body of water," said Danz.

Danz says over the last four days, they responded to 1,800 weather-related 911 calls.