Canal Skater Survives Cold By Slicing Open, Crawling Inside IceHog Mascot

A near-frozen Melissa Gramson is seen here curled up inside the sliced open
IceHog mascot, TUTU on the canal today.

Ottawa - A near-frozen skater on the Rideau Canal survived the icy temperatures by slicing open a nearby IceHog mascot with a skate blade and crawling inside it's warm innards this morning. With temperatures in Ottawa around the -31degree range with windchill, some ill-prepared skaters on the newly opened Rideau Canal ice surface suffered frostbite and in this case, near death.  Twenty year old, third year Political Science student Melissa Gramson, wore only LuluLemon yoga pants and a Roots sweater while skating on the canal this morning, and collapsed to the ice before making it past the first marker. The extreme cold temperatures also collapsed a nearby IceHog mascot, TUTU, whose plush fur could not protect it enough from the cold. Crawling over to the felled mascot, Gramson used her newly sharpened skate blade to slice open the mascot, and crawl inside its still warm stomach cavity.

Paramedics arrived two hours later to find Gramson barely alive inside the mascot intestinal tract, but were able to airlift the Ottawa U student to a nearby hospital where she is recovering in stable condition. TUTU the IceHog mascot was taken to OMRH (Ottawa Mascot Recovery Hospital) where medical staff presume TUTU will make a full recovery and be back waving goofily to the skaters on the canal within the next couple of weeks.