© 2024 Maine Public | Registered 501(c)(3) EIN: 22-3171529
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
Scroll down to see all available streams.
The Rural Maine Reporting Project is made possible through the generous support of the Betterment Fund.

Snowmobile Incidents Kill Woman Soon to Give Birth; Leave Four Others Stranded

GREENWOOD, Maine - A woman was killed Saturday after losing control of the snowmobile she was operating. 

Cpl. John MacDonald with the Maine Warden Service says 30 year old Elizabeth Abelson, of Gloucester, Massachusetts, was also due to give birth to a child in early March. Abelson's unborn child was also killed.
According to authorities, Abelson was was driving a recently acquired 2019 Ski-Doo Grand Touring snowmobile with her husband, when she apparently lost control of the machine, and was ejected into a tree.

Abelson was wearing a helmet. The incident remains under investigation. 

Also on Saturday, Maine Game Wardens say a party of snowmobilers managed to escape fatality when they encountered thin ice.  Four people operating four machines were crossing Sebec Lake, near Dover-Foxcroft, when two of the snowmobiles crashed through the lake ice and sank. A third was left on thin ice, and the fourth was able to be driven off the lake.

Two of the riders fell into the icy water, but were able to make it out again, with three of the party  becoming trapped on thin ice. The fourth rider was able to take the remaining snowmobile to a nearby camp, where he was later located by wardens and taken to the hospital with severe hypothermia.

Two of the machines remain at the bottom of the lake, with the third abandoned on the ice.