PEPIN, Wis. — Three person who died when their \pontoon boat overturned Saturday night on Lake Pepin were from Wabasha, a few miles away in Minnesota. They were:

> Manuel De Angel-Sola, age 52.

> Nicholas Loechler, 46

> Ashley Monson, 37.

Two of them were volunteers with the Wabasha Fire Department. Besides Wabasha, the Department serves outlying Minnesota townships and Alma and Nelson in Wisconsin. In total the Fire Department had 30 active members. The names of three survivors, one of who, was hospitaziwed, haven’t been released. The lead accident investigator, Pepin County Sheriff Curt Struwe, has been slow with updates  on what happened. The accident was reported at 10:30 p.m. on Saturday, 2-1/2 days ago.

Earlier: Wabasha firefighters died in Lake Pepin tragedy

Earlier:Three bodies recovered from Lake Pepin

Earlier: Pepin boaters missing in pontoon wreck

WINONA, Minn. — Police arrested a man well known to them, Christoher Wayne Swinger, after a man reported being followed by Swinger, who had rummaged through his trash outside and then come inside. An argument ensued. This was about 1 a.m. in the 150 block of East Fifth Street. Police classified the incident as “an active disturbance.” Because Swinger is known to carry knives and machetes, officers attempted a pat-down  for weapons. They said Swinger bristled and cursed and refused, all while sweating profusely. They managed to cuff him. In a pants pocket, they said, was a meth pipe. A fuller search found 1.9 grams. Swinger, age 50, who is homeless, was booked at jail for drug possession.

Earlier: Cops bust squatters from Broadway house

Swinger. Didn’t want pat-down.

WINONA, Minn. — Police found a 19-year-old Winona man flat on the ground near Fifth and Center streets with a banged-up face. A breath test showed Reilly Joseph Larson’s blood was almost 0.26% alcohol — more than triple the state’s base intoxication level. He had no idea he was at, where he lived, or which direction to go to get there, officers said. Medics were called to determine whether he needed transport to the hospital to have his stomach pumped. After being cleared medically, he was turned over to a friend to take home — and issued a ticket for underage consumption. About his face injuries, the friend said they werevslow to heal from a from a fall at Steamboat Days 1-1/2 weeks ago.

What about July 14th? The corn is tasseling at seven-plus feet along Engen Road in Wisconsin’s southern Trempealeau County. Image: Steve Lunde

WINONA, Minn. — Police logged the season’s first “unwanted vistor” report on a rattlesnake in the city limits. The call was at 8:40 p.m. from the Michaelwood Drive subdivision off Gilmore valley Road — in the 200 block, about as far up the coulee as  homes have been built. A snake handler was called to corral  and relocate the snake.

Rattlesnake profile

Timber rattlesnakes once were abundant in southeast Minnesota and southwest Wisconsin but now are relatively rare. They require active conservation and protection to ensure their continued existence. When notified of a snake in a human habitat area, police call in a snake wrangler to remove the snake and relocate it to an area that is safe for people and safe for snakes. Advice: A coiled rattlesnake can strike as much as four feet. Walk away, not around the snake, says Steve Winter of Winona, with the Minnesota Rattlesnake Responders team.

WINONA, Minn. — During a stop for running a red light, a police officer spotted open containers of potable alcohol inside the vehicle. “Been drinking?” Yes, responded Asher Allen Merkel, 25, of Winona, the officer said. He wasn’t surprised. Merkel’s eyes were bloodshot and watery and his speech slurred. A roadside test showed a blood-alcohol level of 0.l9%, almost 2-1/2 what’s allowed. This was about 9 p.m. at Second and Wilson streets on the Near West Side.

Merkel. DWI charged at elevated recidivist level

LAKE CITY, Minn.  — Two of the boaters who died in a late-night collision on Lake Pepin over the weekend were off-duty firefighters from Wabasha, according to Lake City Mayor Brian Quinn.  The mayor deferred to Pepin County Sheriff Joel Wener in Wisconsin on releaseing the names. Wener is leading the investigation because the accident occurred on the Wisconsin side of the 24-square mile lake. Wener has not released names of either the three who died or of the three others who survived. The usual custom in policing is to withhold names until next of kin are notified but not more than 24 hours, which affords authorities plenty of time to make contact. It was believed the people on the capsized pontoon boat had set out from Lake City, which has the largest marinas on Lake Pepin. The firefighters’ homes, in Wabasha, is 12 miles away at Lake Pepin’s outlet on the Minnesota side.

Earlier: Three bodies recovered from Lake Pepin

Earlier: Pepin boaters missing in pontoon wreck

LEWISTON, Minn. — A Winona man was killed when he drove into a dump truck in a road construction zone southwest of Lewiston. This was about 9 a.m. Zackary Wayne Ford, 43, was unresponsive when first-responders arrived. Winona County deputies said the dump truck had stopped for a a flagger who was holding a stop sign in the construction zone. Ford, in a 1992 Mazda MX-5, hit the rear of the truck.

WINONA, Minn. – The Fire Department reported 25 emergency medical calls plus 11 fire calls in recent days:

> Monday, July 13: No medical calls plus no fire calls.

> Sunday, July 12: 5 medical calls plus 5 fire call.

> Saturday, July 11: 7 medical calls plus no fire calls.

> Friday, July 10: 6 medical calls plus no fire calls.

> Thursday, July 9: 3 medical calls plus 4 fire calls.

> Wednesday, July 8: 4 medical calls plus 2 fire calls.

Earlier: Emergency, fire crews make 47 calls

WINONA, Minn. — A patient at the Winona hospital’s intensive-care unit left a trail of destruction — with damage estimated at $50,000 — and stormed down a stairwell into the street. This was about 5:20 a.m. There were no injuries.  Damage would have been worse had not a hospital security officer wrestled a fire extinguisher from the man as he attempted to foam up the ICU unit. The man continued his rampage on his way out, knocking over every ICU computer monitor.  A heart-beat monitor was also smashed. Police found the man outside and took him into custody. He was Kyle Thomas Abraham Snyder, age 38. Snyder was known well to police as a troubled member of the Winona homeless community. Police had been dealing with him almost daily, mostly for alcohol-related incidents. Snyder had been hospitalized at the recommendation of social workers who declared he was unable to care for himself. Over the past few days he had walked out five times. Each time he was located quickly and returned. Snyder also was disruptive in the emergency room four days earlier, police said. He threatened to grab a doctor and throw her out the window. He begged her to call police so he could grab an officer’s gun and kill her.

Snyder. Charged with violent threats, felony damage  to property.

DAKOTA, Minn. — A traveler was injured when he struck a guardrail at the Interstate 90 interchange where Highways 14 and 61 converge from Winona. Brian Fitzgerald Jackson, age 62, of Peshastin, Washington, suffered non-life threatening injuries. This was about 10 p.m. Jackson was taken seven miles to a LaCrosse hospital. He was driving east toward Wisconsin in a 1998 Subaru Forrester. First-responders from Dakota said he was belted and his airbag deployed.

PEPIN, Wis. — Three bodies have been recovered from Lake Pepin, where a pontoon pleasure craft with six persons aboard capsized overnight.  Three of the victims were rescued from the water within an hour. Searchers took most of Sunday to locate and retrieve the bodies of the other three victims. An armada of rescue boats, helicopters and drones from 10 agencies on both the Wisconsin and Minnesota sides of the lake were mobilized for the search. Authorities declined to release the names of the victims or where they were from. Wabasha County Sheriff Curt Struwe confirmed that one survivor was hospitalized. The other two survivors didn’t require medical attention, he said.

Mississippi River barge array. Each barge is 95 feet long. Piloting is from a towering wheelhouse  atop the pusher towboat.

The three recovered bodies were taken to St. Paul for autopsies by the Minnesota state medical examiner.  The U.S. Coast Guard, which licenses commercial watercraft on the Mississippi River, including Lake Pepin, was expected to lead an investigation. Among many questions:

> Did the pontoon boat ram a consist pf barges traversing the lake ahead of a pusher towboat. Some barge consists are 500 feet long. Barge arrays typically move at 5 to 8 mph on the lake.

> Or did the pontoon boat ram the barges?

> Or was turgid wake from the towboat’s twin screws a factor?

> Was the towboat crew, at the rear of the barges, aware of what happened? Pusher tows, some with 6,000-horseppower diesel engines, drown out ambient noise.

> What were lake conditions? Lake Pepin can range from placid in light breezes to turbulent in storms. Also: Small craft are especially vulnerable to wakes from other vessels, such as from twin-screw towbars.

Earlier: Pepin boaters missing in pontoon wreck

ARCADIA, Wis. — Three people were arrested during Trump deportation operation Thursday in Arcadia. The arrests were confirmed by the Immigration and Enforcement agency only when pressed by news media queries. The Arcadia arrests were part of an ICE surge in Wisconsin that, according to scattered reports, netted 57 immigrant arrests. The Arcadia arrests came to the public only after Facebook posting by the citizen group Ice Out Coulee. Video showed ICE agents in the city. Their vests bore the letters HSI, short for Homeland Security investigator, which is the parent federal organization of ICE.  The Trump administration has shifted away from references to ICE after early 2026 operations that discedited the organization for brutality and murders in Minneapolis, St. Paul and other cities with anti-Trump leanings. The new lower profile doesn’t mean a retreat from Trump’s goal of 1 million deportations of dark-skin immigrants this year.

South Milwaukee protest. Immigrant sympathizers marched over the weekend to protest to ICE incursions into Wisconsin. It’s known there were at least 57 arrests statewide Last week. Image: Isiah Holmes

DUMFRIES, Minn. — A Minneapolis biker was injured when he left the roadway and crashed where State Highway 60 from Wabasha drops down for the first time to the Zumbro River. Ryan Scott Fatturi, age 37, was airlifted to a Rochester hospital. Medically he was described in sustainable condition. He was alone on the 2011 Suzuki GSX-R600. The accident was at County Road 81. He was helmeted, said Wabasha County deputies. The accident was about 5:35 p.m.

WEST ALBANY, Minn. — A Mabel man was injured when his motorcycle and a pickup truck collided from opposite directions near this Zumbro River village Robert Wayne Thompson, 68, was taken 32 miles to the Lake City hospital. First-responders from Wabasha reported Thompson’s condition as less than life threatening. The accident was about 2 p.m. on State Highway 60 at County Road 13. Thompson was heading west toward Zumbro Falls on a Harley Davidson. The other vehicle, eastbound toward Wabasha, was driven by John Steven Kingsley, 64, of  Zumbro Falls. Neither he nor his passenger, Jeannie Elizabeth Kingsley, 65, of Zumbro Falls, was hurt. They were in a 2021 Ford F150.

PEPIN, Wis. — Three boaters were rescued and three were missing after their pontoon boat capsized after dark on Lake Pepin off Deer Island. First reports said the boat collided with barges in transit through the Mississippi River main navigation channel through the 22-mile lake. Police dispatchers in Pepin County, Wisconsin, and Wabasha County, Minnesota, received emergency calls about 10:45 p.m.: People in the water and screaming. This was within 15 minutes of the accident. Three boaters were found clinging to the capsized pontoon boat and werec pulled from the water. One person reportedly was injured. The survivors said three fellow boaters were missing.  A massive search with watercraft was expanded immediately. Helicopters and drones cwere aclled in. The accident was off the Wisconsin shoe of the lake near the landmark YMCA Deer Island youth camp.  This is on a seven-mile stretch between the village sof s Stockholm and Pepin. Pepin County Sheriff Joel Wener confirmed that no campers from the YMCA camp were involved.

DAKOTA, Minn. — A traveler was injured when he struck a guardrail at the Interstate 90 interchange where Highways 14 and 61 converge from Winona. Brian Fitzgerald Jackson, age 62, of Peshastin, Washington, suffered non-life threatening injuries. This was about 10 p.m. Jackson was taken seven miles to a LaCrosse hospital. He was driving east toward Wisconsin in a 1998 Subaru Forrester. First-responders from Dakota said he was belted and his airbag deployed.

LANESBOTO, Minn. — A Harmony man who had driven a horse-drawn buggy 14 miles to Lanesboro was injured in a collision with a motor car. Harvey J Hershberger, age 74, was taken 24 miles to a Rochester hospital. His injuries were described as sustainable. The accident occurred about 6:20 p.m. on U.S. Highway 16 through Lanesboro at Sheridan Street West. The car was a 2015 Chevrolet Camaro driven by Richard James Horihan, 76, of Lanesboro. He was unhurt. Alcohol was suspected, local police reported the State Patrol.