Air search for missing Nunavik hunters ends

After six days of searching for three missing hunters from Salluit, the Joint Rescue Coordination Centre in Trenton, Ont, has ended its air search. An Air Inuit Twin Otter, shown here, has also been involved in the search effort. Teams from Salluit, Kangiqsujuaq and other Nunavik communities continue to search for Frankie Ikey, his son Stas, and family friend Adamie Alaku, who have been missing since June 8 when they left to go seal hunting in the vicinity of Deception Bay. (PHOTO BY YAAKA JAAKA)

The official air search for three Nunavik hunters who failed to return home June 8 from seal hunting near Salluit ended in the afternoon of June 15.

After six days of extensive air searches around Salluit, the Joint Rescue Coordination Centre in Trenton, Ont. decided to end its air search in the Hudson Strait.

Speaking to Nunatsiaq News at about 3:30 p.m., Capt. Jean Houde said that the entire area had been searched “with negative results.”

The search effort would now be turned into a “missing persons” case, he said.

Weather permitting, two Hercules aircraft and a Cormorant helicopter had set out from Iqaluit’s airport every day, looking for signs of Frankie Ikey, his son Stas, and family friend Adamie Alaku, missing since June 8 when they left to go seal hunting in the vicinity of Deception Bay.

The aircraft are now en route back to their home bases, Houde said.

An Air Inuit Twin Otter has also been involved in the search effort.

Teams from Salluit, Kangiqsujuaq and other Nunavik communities continued to search for the missing men on June 15 and 16.

The Joint Rescue Coordination Centre first received a call June 9 about the missing hunters and sent a Hercules aircraft from Winnipeg to the scene, he said.

A second Hercules aircraft from Trenton, a helicopter and an Air Inuit Twin Otter were finally involved in the air searches, looking, sector by sector, over a large area.

But they came back with no sight of the three men, who set off seal hunting June 8 in a 22-foot freighter canoe, with hunting gear, satellite phone and an HFB radio.