Rescue crews are searching the mountains near Gold River for a 64-year-old Black Creek man who has been missing for days.
The man, according to Comox Valley Ground Search and Rescue, is an experienced hiker who set out from his home on June 29 to tackle a complex 40-kilometre hike around a mountain near Gold River and was following a GPS track that a friend who had previously hiked the area had emailed him.
He was expected to return home in time for dinner on July 2, but never showed up. His vehicle was found on a logging road near Gold River, sparking a search effort that began on Friday morning and has continued into the weekend.
Comox Valley Ground Search and Rescue and Campbell River Volunteer Search and Rescue Society are among those searching for the missing man.
Trained teams from the Lower Mainland and Vancouver Island have since been called in to help find locate the man and on Sunday crews were being dropped into an area around Filberg Mountain by helicopter.
Paul Berry, search manager with Comox Valley Ground Search and Rescue, said the terrain where the man is believed to have gone is very challenging in early summer conditions.
“The area that we are searching is high alpine and very complex terrain with early summer conditions,” Berry said. “We have snowfields, cornices, those sorts of areas that are being covered.”
Berry said the area where the man went is not anywhere near a marked trail, making the search that much more challenging.
Although there is GPS data available that shows the missing man’s last known coordinates, the coordinates have a radius error of four kilometres, making the search that much harder.
That combined with the terrain and a few footprints in the snow, rescuers say there isn’t much for them to go on.
Skye Ryan
