Police find body frozen underneath ice at Joe Louis Arena

DETROIT, MI — Police in Detroit have had strange murder cases before, but nothing quite like this. In the hours before the Red Wings’ Saturday playoff game with the Colorado Avalanche, city police were called to Joe Louis Arena because there was a human body frozen underneath the team’s playing surface.

The as-yet-unidentified body was first noticed in the morning by the facility’s zamboni driver, Carl Wojechowski. “I was just going to go out and put a fresh coat of water on the ice. But I notice this thingy under the surface and I says to myself, ‘Is that a human?’ And it was! I immediately called the authorities.”

When police got to the scene, they were baffled. The body was said to be frozen face up, with eyes and mouth wide open and hands outstretched as if he were trying to push something. Wojechowski went on to describe the body’s position as, “looking like that fella from Star Wars, only frozen in real ice, not carbonite.”

Soon after, city officials met with Red Wings officials and it was determined that the game would go on as planned, because of how long it would take to unfreeze and then re-freeze the ice. The Red Wings would have had to play their game at a neutral site, which simply wasn’t feasible on such short notice, so the series went on.

While there was some questioning in the press box and among fans in their seats, most people seemed not to notice the body, possibly due to the fact the team spent hours driving the Zamboni over the surface.

Even though most of the crowd wasn’t aware what was happening, the players certainly noticed. And not everybody enjoyed the experience.

“It was strange,” said Wings defenseman Chris Chelios. “I kept skating over that guy’s face. I felt bad about it at first, but as the game went on, I got used to it. He probably enjoyed the action – hell of a view, really.”

It’s going to be tough for this sport to sweep any nations, but it’s still pretty frickin’ cool!