An adult and four children were rescued after midnight Monday, July 5, by a State Game Warden who found them adrift in a boat without power on Lake Dunmore in Salisbury.
Warden Wesley Butler received a call just after midnight from New Haven State Police advising that the Burlington U.S. Coast Guard station had been alerted to a disabled vessel on Lake Dunmore. Warden Butler called the wife of the boat operator, Carrie Carrasco, who told him that her husband, Jeffrey L. Carrasco, 49, of St. Johnsbury had left the north end of the lake and was enroute to the island approximately halfway down the lake to watch fireworks with four children, including a toddler, but that his boat would not start and his cell phone was almost out of battery.
When Warden Butler arrived at Lake Dunmore just after 1:00 a.m. the sky was clear with a temperature of 55°F and a west-northwest breeze. Warden Butler immediately traveled to the area of Lake Dunmore between Sucker Brook and the island where the boat had been reported adrift. After finding them not there, he checked the wind conditions for the prior three hours on his cell phone and saw that the wind had been out of the southeast earlier which led him to believe the vessel might have drifted to a different area in the northwest portion of the lake.
Warden Butler located the disabled vessel at about 1:55 a.m. All occupants advised they were OK, but cold with one child shivering uncontrollably. Both the State Police and the Mrs. Carrasco were updated with the situation. The vessel and occupants were towed off the lake to the Kampersville dock. Medical treatment was refused, and the occupants advised that they were okay and would be able to warm up at the campsite.
Warden Butler’s knowledge and experience operating a boat during darkness hours as well as his vast knowledge of Lake Dunmore aided in a safe rescue of the Carrasco family.