CARRABASSETT VALLEY — The Maine Game Warden Service found several pieces of evidence while searching Rangeley Lake Monday for Yarmouth snowmobiler Dawn Newell that indicate three snowmobile riders reported missing Sunday night from Carrabassett Valley may have also ended up in the lake.
The Warden Service will resume search efforts in Rangeley Tuesday morning to help locate the three men, Kenneth Henderson, 40 of China, Glenn Henderson, 43, of Sabattus, and John Spencer, 41 of Litchfield.
A press conference is scheduled at 10 a.m. Tuesday at the Rangeley Lake Public Boat Launch, he said.
The three men from Maine intended to return to Carrabassett Valley Sunday night from their ride. About 2:30 a.m. Monday morning, the Warden Service was advised that they had not returned and started a search in the area.
A cell phone call made to family or friends Sunday night by one of the snowmobilers indicated they were in Eustis, MacDonald said later Monday morning.
They searched the area with winds reaching 40 mph, he said. They couldn’t see anything with the light snow received Saturday swirling from the wind.
“It’s a vast and complicated area,” MacDonald said.
While searching for Dawn Newell, whose snowmobile went through the ice on Rangeley Lake Sunday night, the warden service “recovered several pieces of evidence indicating that the three subjects may have gone into Rangeley Lake as well,” MacDonald said in a release late Monday afternoon.
The Warden Service will start a search Tuesday morning using airboats, side scan sonar and Warden Service and Maine Forest Service aircraft.
Rangeley Police Department and Fire and Rescue and Franklin County Sheriff’s Department are assisting with search efforts, he said.
MacDonald reminds all ice fishermen to use “extreme caution” when accessing lakes and ponds Tuesday, the first day of ice fishing season.
abryant@sunjournal.com
Send questions/comments to the editors.
