Shane Edwards wasn’t planning on going for a swim within the Yukon River on Thursday, particularly because it was nonetheless coated in ice that very morning.
However the Dawson Metropolis man could not assist himself — he noticed a job to do, and he did it.
“I did it for the fish,” he instructed CBC. “I did not do it for the automobile.”
The automobile was an outdated Honda Civic that was seemingly deserted beside the ferry touchdown in Dawson Metropolis. When the river ice all of a sudden broke on Thursday — a spectacular spring custom in Dawson — the outdated junker appeared destined to be swept downstream with all that ice.
That is when Edwards rolled up.
“I am like, what’s everybody taking photos of, on the aspect, on the financial institution? And I appeared down and there is this little Civic sitting there,” he recalled.
“So I went all the way down to the automobile and seen there was like a 50-foot hydrocarbon slick — so a bunch of oil and fuel and the whole lot like that — going into the river. And yeah, I wasn’t going to face by and let that occur.”
He began working the cellphone, attempting completely different organizations on the town that may have a truck with a winch to tug the automobile out of the rising water. He says he shortly grew pissed off, as folks talked about insurance coverage legal responsibility and different causes to not become involved.
“I used to be like, ‘yeah, I do not actually care about that. It is extra concerning the fish, and you already know, our pure habitat,'” he recalled.
“Everybody was like hemming and hawing [on] all of the protocol and all that. And we had a second to behave, and we needed to act straight away.”
Lastly, he managed to get some assist from the Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in First Nation, which provided a truck with a winch. A few employees — Dave and one other Shane — got here alongside to assist out.
“Two Shanes collectively, we all the time get stuff performed!” Edwards joked.
Edwards waded in to the brown, frigid water to connect the chain to the automobile that was now half-submerged. That was simpler mentioned than performed — and so quickly sufficient, he was swimming.
“I could not discover something to hook on. So I did the dive. Yeah, I dove below the automobile,” he mentioned.
“After which as I used to be swimming out, I discovered this like little hook that simply occurred to be on it. And I hooked [it] as much as that and pulled the chain straight. After which we acquired her outta there.”
The automobile was dragged up on to the dry financial institution, and Edwards acquired into some dry garments. He is a volunteer firefighter so he says he all the time has an additional set of garments in his automobile. Later, again residence, he’d heat up with a protracted bathe and a few scorching espresso.
Edwards says he is glad he was capable of assist. He says he is not the type to take a seat idly by.
“I’ve by no means been that particular person, sadly — typically I put myself by hell and again. However I all the time get the job performed not less than.”
