Family, friends refuse to give up search for missing hiker
“He was the youngest of three siblings, and his mom is just shattered and heartbroken over what has happened. And so are the rest of us – his only daughter, his brother and sister, and all of us in the wider family.”
– Dr. Ramen Saggu
By Bachan Rai
Surrey: Losing a loved one is the ultimate tragedy. But to not know anything about what has happened when someone goes missing is a truly unbearable situation.
And that is the uncertainty facing the family and many friends of Gordon Sagoo, 50, who went missing last weekend while hiking on Baby Munday Peak near Chilliwack. An intensive search was initiated after Sagoo failed to return to the designated rendezvous point for the hiking group he was with at the end of the day.
The Chilliwack RCMP has now scaled back the search. To all intents and purposes, the search operation by public authorities is now over.
“But we still need to know what happened to Gordon,’ said his cousin Dr. Ramen Saggu, who has been fully involved in the search together with the rest of Sagoo’s family and his many friends.
Dr. Saggu said the event has naturally taken a huge toll on the family. “He was the youngest of three siblings, and his mom is just shattered and heartbroken over what has happened. And so are the rest of us – his only daughter, his brother and sister, and all of us in the wider family,” she said.
Dr. Saggu said the family is determined to carry on the search on their own and are leading efforts privately with lots of support from the well-liked and well-connected Sagoo’s friends. Anywhere from eight to 15 people are setting out every day to try and retrace Sagoo’s steps in the hopes of locating him.
“He may have fallen and got hurt, and possibly unable to make his way out on his own. We need to leave no stone unturned to find out exactly what has happened and to find him,” said Dr. Saggu.
But it is a very expensive endeavour. “It’s going to cost us up to $10,000 a day in order to put together an effective search-and-rescue operation on our own,” she said.
People have opened their wallets generously, and so far more than $30,000 has been donated to help in the search. But much more is needed if the search operation is to carry on for a reasonable period.
For those who want to donate, the donation site, with the hashtag #BringGordHome, can be accessed via Facebook. “We are also in the process of setting up a Royal Bank of Canada account to accept donations from those who do not have a social media presence,” said Dr. Saggu.
The initial search was initiated by the RCMP on August 14. Chilliwack RCMP General Duty officers supported by the Upper Fraser Valley Regional Detachment Summer Policing Team, Lower Mainland District Integrated Police Dog Service, and Chilliwack Search and Rescue (SAR) immediately traveled to the site and began combing the mountain looking for the missing hiker.
On August 15, aircraft from the RCMP, Comox 442 Transport and Rescue Squadron, and Valley Helicopters Ltd joined the operation as searchers continued to look for the missing man.
The ground search expanded on August 16 when SAR Teams from Lions Bay, Surrey, Coquitlam, and Kent Harrison arrived on the site to bolster the operation.
Last Saturday, a Remote Piloted Aircraft System of the RCMP Advanced Radio Control Section and an aircraft from Talon Helicopter Ltd equipped with Forward Looking Infrared (FLIR), conducted overhead passes of the areas on the mountain not accessible to the ground crews.
But on August 22, after exhausting all initial efforts to locate Sagoo, police have scaled back the search by standing down the SAR operation.
Dr. Saggu said the family are extremely grateful for and appreciative of the thorough SAR operation conducted by the various public and volunteer authorities.
“They did their best, but eventually just ran out of resources to carry on the operation. Their response was very timely. swift and comprehensive, but unfortunately, did not yield the result everybody sought,” she said.
Sagoo had a mobile phone with him, but Dr. Saggu said the area where he went hiking did not have cellphone reception, and thus there was no signal from the device that searchers could latch onto.
Sagoo also had no prior history of any medical issues that could have caused him to go missing. “He was in fact a fitness trainer, and physically healthy. So there were no prior medical red flags that could possibly have led to what happened,” Dr Saggu said.
She said the family remains hopeful they will be able to locate Sagoo and bring him home. “We need to know what happened, and we are determined to find him.”
