Second search planned for Nunavik youth caught in storm

KANGIQSUJUAQ — Plans for a second search are underway in Puvirnituq, where an 18-year-old man has been missing since mid-December.

Hopes that the man will be found alive, however, are fading.

Jimmy Alasuak went missing Dec. 14 when he got caught in a blizzard while en route to his family’s hunting camp by snowmobile, located 80 kilometres away from the Hudson Bay community.

During the two weeks following Alasuak’s disappearance, ground and air searches were carried out every day by “anyone who was available,” said Puvirnituq mayor Aisara Kenuajuaq, who said residents of neighbouring communities also helped.

But those efforts did not turn up any clues as to Alasuak’s whereabouts.

“There is going to be a smaller search going out soon but we’re not sure when,” Kenuajuaq told Nunatsiaq News.

The disappearance has been difficult for the young man’s family, Kenuajuaq said. Every day that passes makes it harder to imagine Alasuak being found alive, he said, although the young man was trained in survival skills.

“It’s hard to say, it’s been three weeks now,” Kenuajuaq said.

Although Alasuak was no longer a student at Puvirnituq’s Iguarsivik School, he is the son of a teacher there and his disappearance has had a big impact on the entire school.

“We’re all just waiting and hoping,” said principal Judy Renaud. “It’s really a difficult situation. Everybody feels it.”

Renaud remembers teaching Alasuak, then a Grade 7 student, who she described as “pleasant and always smiling.”

The school cancelled its Christmas concert before the holidays while search efforts were still continuing.