My Mother "Runs on Water"

Doug Heath and Jenny Osolinski in Port Radium, Northwest Territories
My parents met at this uranium mining settlement located on the shore of Great Bear Lake in 1948. My dad worked as surveyor in the mine and my mother worked in the laundry.

A few years ago, I was visiting my brother and his family in Canmore, Alberta. While I was there, my mother related a story of an experience she had in Port Radium where she met my father. I think that she had just gotten off the airplane which had landed on the lake. She was with at least one other woman. She said something about how there were some boards across the ice, but that something went wrong. The ice gave way and my mother and others started running as fast as they could. They were running so fast they were able to run “on the water”. While the memory seemed most unbelievable to all of us as we listened, it seemed very much like my mother was absolutely convinced that she had in fact “run on water”. We rationalized that maybe the ice had dipped but not broken through and that water had rushed over. This would explain the visual sense of “running on water” but it would not explain the physical sensation.

Was this possibly a paranormal event? Was my mother perhaps “saved by a guardian angel?”. Note that my mother does believe in angels and I recall that she has talked about them on a few occasions.

DC3 in Port Radium

I recall that my father told me that the plane was used to transport ore. The uranium used in the world’s first atomic bomb test at Trinity site in the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico was mined in Port Radium. The painting on the nose of the plane alludes to the atomic bomb with a cloud that is shaped like a question mark, rather than a mushroom. Was the artist trying to make a political statement about the atomic bomb?