‘It’s been really hard’: Missing Kinngait man’s family waits as search efforts halt for now

Josie Pootoogook was in Ottawa when she learned her son didn’t come home one night in Kinngait.

Her son, 36-year-old Pitseolak Pootoogook, was last seen in the community on Nov. 19, 2022.

Since then, police and the local search-and-rescue team have looked for him, scouring the land and the waters around the hamlet, which has a population of approximately 1,400.

“It’s been really hard,” Josie Pootoogook told Nunatsiaq News.

RCMP in Nunavut are sharing this photo of Pitseolak Pootoogook, 36, who was last seen in Kinngait on Nov. 19. (Photo via RCMP – Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Nunavut/Facebook)

Although the search has stopped for the meantime, RCMP said earlier this week the investigation will remain open.

“We’re just going to wait. And that’s how it is right now,” Josie Pootoogook said.

On Dec. 6, the RCMP’s underwater recovery team along with Kinngait search-and-rescue went to an area near Mallik Island where it is believed Pitseolak Pootoogook was last seen.

“Search efforts were conducted with negative results,” an RCMP news release said at the time.

Josie Pootoogook and her two daughters waited while police officers flew into their community and local teams set out on boats to look for her son.

“Being a mom, a single mom, it was so hard for me,” she said, adding searchers worked around the clock, without success.

“We couldn’t do anything about it and they couldn’t do anything about it. They tried so many times. During the daytime, even nighttime when the tide is low.”

Josie Pootoogook said she isn’t exactly sure what happened the night he went missing, but that her son was expected at home. She said she thinks he may have walked over thin ice and fell in.

She recently filled out a missing person report with the RCMP and said the search will continue in the warmer months, when the ice has melted.

She describes her son as a humble, friendly and kind man who was well-known in the community.

“Here, everybody knows him,” she said. “Everyone knew him very well.

“He was never any trouble. Never bothered people.”

In an email earlier this week, Nunavut RCMP spokesperson Sgt. Pauline Melanson said Kinngait RCMP “conducted a thorough search in conjunction with the community and followed up on any incoming information.”

“At this time, the missing person investigation will remain open and the police will continue to follow up on any information as it comes in,” she said.

Anyone with information on Pitseolak Pootoogook’s whereabouts can contact Kinngait RCMP at 897-1111.