Teen plunges through thin ice at Central Park pond

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    NEW YORK (WCBS) — A teenager from Queens is recovering after falling into an icy pond in Central Park.

It happened near 59th Street and Fifth Avenue on Monday.

CBS2’s Nick Caloway spoke to the boy and his mom.

The teen is doing okay, thanks to the heroics of a stranger. The boy’s mom is sending out a sincere thank you to that hero.

The 14-year-old boy was heard screaming for help after falling through thin ice in the partially frozen pond.

A few hours after that terrifying incident, Caloway talked to the boy and his mom at their home in Astoria.

“And that water was up to his shoulders. And I even asked my son, I said, ‘You were scared?’ And he said, ‘Yeah,’” the mother said.

At around 2 p.m. a tourist was recording a video when he heard loud cries.

“I hear ‘Help! Help!’ And I hear like ice cracking. I look over there, there’s like a kid in the water,” Luciano Bogomolni said.

That’s when good Samaritan Dan McFadden grabbed an ice rescue ladder and jumped into action.

“I just grabbed the ladder. I had one end. It’s just about a six-foot, seven-foot ladder made out of wood. I gave him one end, he held on, and I was able to help pull him out,” McFadden said.

The teen was taken to the hospital to be checked out.

His mom said she knew her son was going to Central Park with friends, but she didn’t know he would walk out on the ice.

She said she thinks Parks Department officials should monitor ponds like this to make sure more kids aren’t hurt.

“If it’s not allowed to go on there, there should be somebody watching, because it’s dangerous,” the mother said.

Even after that incident, CBS2’s Jenna DeAngelis still saw a bunch of people walking around on the ice, apparently unaware someone had fallen through just hours earlier.

Earlier this month, there was a dramatic rescue from New Jersey’s Passaic River after a mother and her 2-year-old daughter fell through the ice.

The boy in Monday’s incident said he is rethinking the idea to go out on the ice.

He is shaken up, but okay. He is now back home in Astoria, with a mother who is grateful for the stranger who saved her boy’s life.

“Because if that man didn’t help my son go back up, my son wouldn’t be here right now,” she said.

In addition to warning signs posted all over, city parks officials told CBS2 they strongly discourage visitors from walking on ice because it is rarely frozen enough to withstand a person’s weight.

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