(Arnolds Park)– It’s official: at long last, the ice has finally gone out of the Okoboji’s.
Kirk Ewen of Arnolds Park keeps track of the official freeze-thaw dates of the Iowa Great Lakes. He tells KUOO news East Lake Okoboji was completely ice-free Tuesday, April 15th, while the ice finally left West Lake Okoboji Thursday.
That’s several weeks later than last year, when the ice left East Lake Okoboji March 26th and West Lake March 28th.
While this year’s dates for ice-out were much later, they were still well-short of setting a record. The latest the ice has gone out of East Lake Okoboji is April 26th back in 1951. The record for West Lake is April 28th set in 1951 and again in 1983.
A portion of Big Spirit Lake still had ice on it as of Wednesday.
