Hole in boat exhaust blamed in girl's carbon monoxide death
Updated 1:30 p.m. | Posted 12:20 p.m.
A hole in a boat's exhaust pipe appears to have led to the death of a 7-year-old girl last weekend from carbon monoxide poisoning.
Sophia Baechler became sick Sunday while boating with her family on Wayzata Bay on Lake Minnetonka.
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According to the Hennepin County Sheriff's Office, she'd gone into a cabin below the deck to rest and the boat's occupants found her 10 minutes later in distress. She was taken to Hennepin County Medical Center where she was pronounced dead.
Investigators found a hole in an exhaust pipe underneath the mattress area of the lower cabin where the girl had gone to rest. Their report says animals apparently chewed through the pipe.
The Hennepin County Medical Examiner said the cause of death was carbon monoxide toxicity and determined the death was accidental.
In 2013, a 4-year-old Maple Grove girl was hospitalized after inhaling a near-lethal amount of carbon monoxide while riding in the back of an open-air boat.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.