MOLINE, Ill. – A pair of men who had set sail for the Gulf of Mexico were blindsided and stranded by a snowstorm on the Mississippi River in Illinois. WQAD reports the men were stranded on a lateral dam after the snowstorm and fog severely reduced visibility on the river.
The rescue was initiated at about 11 a.m. on Tuesday and Quad-Cities online identifies the pair as Tanner Ballengee and Conner Morton. The visibility was so limited that rescuers had them utilize flares to aid their recovery.
“The snow just kept coming down, and then we lost all visibility. We couldn’t see anything. It was just complete white. We had no idea where the channel was,” Ballengee told WQAD.
The men were reportedly uninjured despite the freezing temperatures, but their journey for the moment has been cut at least 1,000 miles short of the intended destination.
(Editor’s note: Video is courtesy of affiliate WQAD)
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