Ice Diving

[Adam6521]

I got a chance to practice this.  A person went out and broke through the ice.  I had a suit on, and had ice fishing picks in my arm pocket.  They sell these so if people fall through they can pull them selves out. 
Crawled out, gave the person a rescue ring.  Got in the water with the person and worked with the rescue ring and I pushed them up and out.  Than put them on a board and others pulled them to shore.
Most important thing is to get them to a warm place, remove all clothing and use heat packs if available on their core to re warm, you could put hot packs on the persons femoral artery's.  The two main arteries that are in your hip/pelvis area that supply blood to your lower extremities. Use many dry blankets, use oxygen if available and you could also put the persons feet higher than their head while laying on back in the trendonlanberg postion or the "shock" postion.  Of course it important to get them to hospital if possible.

[Firecaptn15]

Just a thought in regards to a person that has gone underwater, if they have only been under for a short time, (30 min or less) it is entirely possible that it is still a rescue operation not a recovery, Alot depends on the person and primarily on the water temp. That being said not much is different from what max posted and it takes a trained team to do it.

In regards to using heat packs. while your intent is good it can be dangerous. as a drowning or near drowning occurs the body reverts to anaerobic(without oxygen) metabolism this causes a buildup of lactic acid in the muscles and if released too rapidly by exercise or warming can put a unstable person into cardiac arrest.

The saying in E.M.S. is "they are not dead till they are warm and dead" Hypothermia does neat things for survivability in humans. (Hospitals are now starting to use it in for recovery after heart attacks and such).