I was reading a (wonderful heated rivalry fic) that had some pond skating that has made me feel obligated to make a safety statement (especially since I’ve seen some people mention wanting to go skating on the Rideau canal** and just visit Canada in general).
If ever you decide to go skating on a body of water, it being cold the previous night is not an indication that it is frozen enough to skate on.
Water does not get as cold at the same rate as the air, and if the water is deep and/or has a current, the water will not freeze with a thick enough (or strong enough) layer to hold your body weight safely (especially as the blades on your skates cut through the ice.
You need to drill and measure the thickness of the ice to know if it is safe.
And depending on the circumstances (such as those listed above) even weeks of -30+ degrees will not freeze the water enough to safely skate on.
The following photos were taken on the same day after a week where it was below -30 degrees every night and in the mid-20s during the day. As you can see, lots of snow, a decent amount of time to cool off (these were taken around the 30th of December in Quebec) and that water is nowhere near frozen!
The biggest safety issue is that hypothermia sets in within minutes and if you’re in your winter gear you will sink incredibly quickly.
So please, just be careful and trust that one night of cold is not enough to go skating outside on a pond, even less to do so without checking the thickness of the ice.
**note that the Rideau canal is opened when Ottawa measures a thickness enough ice.
