{"id":103726,"date":"2026-02-03T09:55:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-03T09:55:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/103726\/"},"modified":"2026-02-03T09:55:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-03T09:55:07","slug":"pittsburgh-ems-chief-urges-public-to-stay-off-frozen-rivers-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/103726\/","title":{"rendered":"Pittsburgh EMS chief urges public to stay off frozen rivers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img fetchpriority=\"high\" width=\"300\" height=\"168\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Untitled-4.png\" class=\"attachment-medium size-medium wp-image-731502\" alt=\"\" loading=\"eager\" decoding=\"async\"\/>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>VIDEO: An urgent warning from Pittsburgh EMS: Stay off the ice.<\/p>\n<p>Video from over the weekend shows people venturing out onto Pittsburgh\u2019s frozen rivers, but public safety leaders say it\u2019s never a good idea.<\/p>\n<p>Ranging from a man evading police on the frozen Allegheny River to visitors at Point State Park, people just could not seem to stay off the ice.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOver the weekend, we got several emergency alerts for people walking on the ice,\u201d Pittsburgh EMS Chief Amera Gilchrist said.<\/p>\n<p>Pittsburgh\u2019s frozen rivers are attracting a lot of attention.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t think the immediate public understands the dangers of walking along the ice,\u201d Gilchrist said. \u201cIt takes about four to five inches of solid ice to be able to hold an adult person and there\u2019s no way to tell the thickness of the ice and which places the ice is thicker or thinner.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Chief Gilchrist says one wrong step could send you into the water and under the ice.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe water is moving, is actively moving, so it\u2019s very easy to fall through the ice and get swept away,\u201d Gilchrist said.<\/p>\n<p>WPXI-TV NBC 11 Pittsburgh<\/p>\n<p>        <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/f2a985bb6ec1175d22f78b494569a62b.jpg\" width=\"1280\" height=\"720\" alt=\"Officials urge people to stay away from icy rivers\" loading=\"lazy\" fetchpriority=\"low\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"VIDEO: An urgent warning from Pittsburgh EMS: Stay off the ice. Video from over the weekend shows people&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":103727,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[8338,28,73,75,74],"class_list":["post-103726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-mid-atlantic-region","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103726\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/103727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}