INTERNATIONAL FALLS, Minn. (AP) — Flags flew at half-staff in Minnesota and at national parks across the country Tuesday for a Voyageurs National Park ranger who died while trying to rescue a family of three stranded by high waves on a lake.
Kevin Grossheim, 55, of Kabetogama, died Sunday while responding to a call for assistance for a father and two sons who were trapped on an island in Namakan Lake after their boat became disabled. Winds gusting over 40 mph (64 kph) had whipped up waves of 5 to 6 feet (1.5 to 1.8 meters) Sunday morning.
“One of the rangers that was out there said he has never seen conditions as wild as they were,” St. Louis County Sheriff Gordon Ramsay said.
Grossheim reached them with his boat, but it overturned after he picked them up, the National Park Service said.
“The front kind of nosedived, the boat listed, and flipped over upside-down,” Ramsay said. An initial report by the park that the ranger was towing the family’s boat proved to be inaccurate, he said.