Toddler falls in lake, drowns

MAT-SU — An 18-month-old boy drowned in Big Lake during what was an extremely busy Memorial Day weekend for local emergency responders.

Alaska State Troopers say the drowning was reported at 3:06 p.m., Sunday. The toddler, Liam Lloyd, fell off a dock at the family’s cabin. Trooper spokeswoman Megan Peters said the cabin is on Long Island.

“He was found when the parents realized they hadn’t seen him. They pulled him from the water and started CPR,” Peters wrote in an email.

He was taken to shore, where a trooper and two Coast Guard members were doing boating safety checks. The trooper and the guardsmen attempted CPR while medics were en route.

From there, Lloyd was airlifted to Providence Alaska Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead. Troopers say he was not wearing a life vest.

Farther up the Parks Highway, 20 acres burned just off the highway in the Willow area near Mile 74. The state’s Division of Forestry threw multiple aircraft and a hotshot crew at it, as well as numerous trucks and local volunteer firefighters.

“We called that one contained this morning,” forestry spokesman Joel Nudelman said Monday afternoon.

He said crews were still mopping up as he spoke. It was estimated to have burned around seven acres and threatened several homes, damaging one.

Forestry’s daily briefing says the fire started due to “burning in an unapproved device.” Nudelman declined to be more specific.

“It’s under investigation at this time,” he said.

He said it was the biggest fire of the weekend in this area of the state.

Along the Matanuska River downstream of the Old Glenn Highway Bridge, a 911 call from a gravel bar shortly after 10 a.m., Saturday summoned rescuers to where five people needed saving.

According to troopers, Austin Lashbrook, 20, and four juveniles drove to the gravel bar in a Ford Ranger and set up camp. They slept there, but woke up to a surprise.

“The water in the river had risen and they could not get back across,” according to the trooper press statement.

Troopers decided wading also was a bad idea so they brought in a trooper jet boat and shuttled the five people to shore. None of them were injured. Troopers say the water rose dramatically overnight due to high temperatures and increased runoff.

Also on Saturday, at 7:14 a.m. along a different river— the Knik in this case — troopers are investigating the death of a 17-year-old boy.

The boy “was camping with friends near Knik River Road,” according to the report. “The group awoke and found the male not breathing.”

The boy was taken to Mat-Su Regional Medical Center and pronounced dead.

Elsewhere, troopers were kept busy with a loud party in Big Lake that netted eight teens tickets for underage drinking, at least three drunken driving arrests as of Monday — one of which led to an accident — and three accidents, including one involving a moose, another an ATV and the third a semi with double trailers, and various other infractions.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.