SUNDRE – Several volunteers with Sundre Search and Rescue have been mobilized to assist their counterparts in Red Deer who are conducting an operation initiated after RCMP received a report of human remains found in a park area of the city.
“Yesterday around noon, we got a call from our search and rescue dispatch that the Red Deer SAR team was requesting assistance from other SAR teams,” Roger Tetreault, a senior search manager, told the Albertan on Friday.
Although he was not among them, Tetreault said three members went out to work alongside RCMP and Red Deer’s volunteer search team until just into the evening.
“There was a request as well yesterday for us to return today,” he said shortly after the lunch hour.
“We have five searchers plus a SAR manager helping the command team with technical mapping,” he said.
“Unless they find one big item that they’re looking for, they’ll probably keep them there all day.”
On Saturday, March 29, the Red Deer RCMP received a report about human remains being found in the Gaetz Lakes Sanctuary.
“I’m assuming that that’s public knowledge now that someone was hiking around looking for animal sheds – antlers” when the remains were discovered, said Tetreault.
“So, that triggered the search,” he said.
“RCMP attended and recovered the remains which have been transported to the Calgary Office of the Chief Medical Examiner,” reads part of a press statement issued Thursday, April 3.
Although technically in Red Deer, the site presents a substantial amount of ground for search and rescue teams to cover.
“It’s a big area,” said Tetreault.
As to whether a search team from Sundre might head back out again on Saturday, April 5, it was too soon to say.
“That’s completely up to the RCMP to determine,” he said.
Although more commonly dispatched to conduct operations in the bush out in the West Country, a search in a large park situated within an urban area isn’t unheard of, he said.
“We actually have done a lot of searches and in these conditions, it puts a lot of boots on the ground that can get the job done in a short amount of time,” he said.
“We’ve gained the respect and trust of the RCMP to be used in these sensitive matters,” he said, adding Sundre’s volunteers are proficient and have developed a good relationship with Mounties.
“All of our members, they do this because they want to serve their community,” he added.
“As grim as it may seem, that’s important to the family,” he said about completing the task at hand as fast as possible to help bring closure.
“From what I’ve seen in social media, there’s of course a huge public response of wanting to help and see what’s going on. So you want to have things wrapped up as quick as possible, absolutely,” he said.
“The more people you can get out, the better.”
The RCMP continues to work with the medical examiner to determine the identity of the remains and the search of the area remains underway. Police are asking the public to avoid the area and stay on trails in this environmentally-sensitive location.
Police said an update about this investigation is anticipated once more information is known.
