Town manager in Maine drowns after saving son

A man who manages a town in Maine died after he and his four-year-old son fell into a frozen pond close to their house.

Kevin Howell, who is 51 years old and lives in Carmel, pulled his son out of the water and told him to go get his mother, according to the local sheriff’s office.

Katie Howell went to the water with an anchor and rope, but she fell through the ice and had to be saved.

Her husband disappeared and was found in the water hours later.

Mr Howell was a really good guy who cared about the community, according to Daniel Frye who lives in the town.

“He always wanted to improve the town. ”

The leader of the town and his son, Sawyer, were taking a walk when something happened on Friday morning, at 6:30 am.

After Howell helped his son back onto the ice, the boy ran about one-third of a mile to tell his mother at home.

She called for help and tried to help her husband, but she also fell into Etna Pond and couldn’t get out.

Detective Jordan Norton was nearby when he heard a call for help. He went onto the dangerous ice and brought Mrs. Howell to safety.

But Howell was nowhere to be found even when the Maine Warden Service and the Carmel Fire Department came to help.

Two divers who work for the warden service found the town manager’s body in the early afternoon, just before 2:00 pm local time (7:00 pm GMT).

The Howells moved to Carmel in 2014. Carmel is a small town with less than 3,000 people, about 16 miles west of Bangor.

“His death is a great sadness for the town. ”

Mr Howell was in charge of running the town and making sure all the town departments were doing their jobs. He also had to prepare and present the yearly budget.

He got an award in 2018 for helping to make the town’s recycling better, and then again in 2020 for doing new and brave things as a public manager.

The website of the town said he liked making things out of wood, doing winter sports, growing his family’s farm, and cooking for his family and friends.