Three men aged between 36 and 46 were killed after their vehicle fell through the ice on Khuvsgul Lake in northwestern Mongolia over the weekend. They were transporting three reindeers by a UAZ-451 truck.

A total of 39 people including rescuers were involved in the operation to retrieve the three bodies from the icy lake. Now, the rescuers are working to pull the vehicle out. The Mongolian National Emergency Agency (NEMA) has warned people against driving on any frozen lake as the ice is now more likely to be thin.

Lake Khuvsgul is located in the northwestern Khuvsgul province near the Russian border. The lake is the second largest freshwater lake in Asia after Baikal, and holds nearly 70 percent of Mongolia’s fresh water and 0.4 percent of all the fresh water in the world. It is 1645 meters above sea level, 136 km long and 262 meters deep.