CHICAGO — On Sunday evening, Gerald Belz, an 18-year-old freshman at the University of Iowa, was lingering at his parents’ house in Cedar Rapids, a half-hour from the campus in Iowa City. It had just started snowing.

His father, Michael Belz, popped his head in Gerald’s bedroom. “I told him with the cold and everything, the roads are going to get slippery pretty quick,” Mr. Belz recalled.

So Gerald gathered up his things, said his goodbyes and drove back to his dorm. Around 10 p.m., he called his mother to give her the customary assurance: He had arrived safely.

That was the last night that Gerald’s parents spoke with him. Early Wednesday morning, he was found unconscious outside, a short walk from his dorm, and died later at a hospital. Investigators believe his death was related to the subzero temperatures that plunged Iowa and all of the Midwest into a miserable and dangerous cold this week.

Gerald Belz is one of at least eight people whose deaths are believed to be tied to the bitter weather system that has paralyzed the region, sent scores of people to hospitals with symptoms of hypothermia or frostbite, and closed businesses, schools and many colleges. Among those who have perished: An elderly Illinois man who fell and was found not far from his home; a man who was hit by a snowplow in the Chicago region; a couple in a vehicle crash along snowy roads in Indiana; and a Milwaukee man who the police say was found in his garage and likely froze to death.

Mr. Belz said he hoped to learn more from the police soon, but said he had no idea what his son might have been doing that took him outside his dorm room that night. Officials at the local medical examiner’s office said they had performed an autopsy, but did not have final results and would not release information on the cause of death until they did. University of Iowa police said their investigation was ongoing, but that Gerald’s death was believed to be related to the weather.

Gerald Belz, a pre-med student, had been in contact with his girlfriend in the hours before he died, and dropped off social media around 1 a.m., she has said. He told her that he was going to go to bed.

Mr. Belz said Gerald, the older of two sons, was careful and compassionate; a studious teenager and avid rugby player who wanted to become a doctor. He was already ahead in his college studies because he had completed Advanced Placement classes in high school.

Mr. Belz had been thinking about Gerald more than usual on Monday and Tuesday, with the news dominated by warnings about the brutally cold temperatures. Told that his son was going to stay on campus for the week, Mr. Belz agreed that it was a safer plan: Gerald had had some trouble getting his truck started lately, so Mr. Belz was planning to drive to campus on Friday and give the battery a jump.

“At the time I thought that was the smart move,” Mr. Belz said. “I didn’t want him to get stuck somewhere driving. So he decided he would stay.”

Source: Read Full Article