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Minnesota News
Dan Kraker
Duluth

Voyageurs National Park ranger dies while helping stranded boaters in rough waters

A boat passes through a channel in Voyageurs.
A lone boat cruises through island channels in Voyageurs National Park in 2016. The National Park Service said a ranger drowned in Namakan Lake on Sunday, amid high winds and rough waters.
Evan Frost | MPR News 2016

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A Voyageurs National Park ranger died Sunday while responding to a call for help from a boat stranded on Namakan Lake amid high waves and rough waters.

According to the National Park Service, the ranger’s boat capsized while towing the other vessel, forcing the ranger, along with the three occupants of the other boat, into the water.

The three members of the public who were being assisted were able to swim to safety.

But the park service ranger didn’t surface. The ranger’s body was later recovered from the lake at about 3:20 p.m. after a three-hour search.

Namakan Lake is a large lake along the U.S.-Canadian border about, 40 miles east of International Falls.

The ranger’s name is being withheld until all notifications are made. The incident remains under investigation.

The United States Border Patrol, St. Louis County Sheriff’s Office and Kabetogama Fire Department assisted in the search and recovery effort.

In social media posts Sunday, St. Louis County Sheriff Gordon Ramsay said his office was involved in several water rescues on northern lakes in rough conditions.

Ramsay posted that he was “saddened by the tragic loss today of a law enforcement Park Ranger. The Ranger rescued a family when large waves caused the Ranger’s boat to take on water and flip. Tragically the Ranger was killed in the incident. The Ranger died doing what he loved to do, helping others.”

“His partners and deputies who worked with him all knew he had a servant’s heart as big as the Park he patrolled,” Ramsey wrote. “Our thoughts go out the Ranger, his partners, friends, family and National Park Service.”