St. Joseph, MI – Police on Monday were hoping to climb aboard a boat where one person died Sunday and two others were made seriously ill due to carbon monoxide poisoning.
Police believe the poisoning was accidental.
“The boat is secured at the (U.S.) Coast Guard station,” Berrien County Sheriff Paul Bailey said. “Our goal today is to be able to go down into the cabin and figure out why this happened.”
Leonard Anthony Russian, 53, was dead on arrival at Lakeland Medical Center, St. Joseph. Richard Cook, 63, of Granger Ind., was transferred from Lakeland to a Grand Rapids hospital, and Lorri Lynn Mroz, 45, was kept at Lakeland, Sheriff’s Sgt. Shawn Yech said in a news release. Russian and Mroz are from Cass County.
Police and ambulance crews were called Sunday afternoon on a report of a medical emergency on a boat in Lake Michigan off Jean Klock Park in Benton Harbor. An ambulance crew went aboard the boat to remove three people.
Bailey said Monday morning that all three victims had carbon monoxide poisoning, but police did not know for sure what caused the exposure.
“It wasn’t safe to go down into the cabin last night,” Bailey said. “We’re waiting for the levels (of carbon monoxide) to be down.”
The sheriff said two Medic 1 ambulance paramedics were overcome Sunday while removing the people from the boat. They both were released after treatment and monitoring at Lakeland, Bailey said.
“It’s my understanding they were kept a few hours until their (oxygen) levels were normal,” he said.