The entire community of Vanderhoof is operating in a state of shock and disbelief as search efforts to locate missing local girl Madison Scott continue more than a week after her disappearance.
The 20-year-old was last seen at 3 a.m. on Saturday, May 28 during a party at Hogsback Lake, 25 kilometres south of town.
Scott left Vanderhoof on Friday, May 27 with the intention of camping overnight at the lake.
Her family called the Vanderhoof RCMP detachment on Sunday at 2 p.m. when she failed to return home. Police who attended the area on Sunday, May 29 located her tent and her truck, but extensive search efforts to locate her have been unsuccessful so far.
Police say that Scott's phone was last used at 7 a.m. on Saturday morning - approximately four hours after she was last seen.
Volunteers from Vanderhoof, Burns Lake and Prince George Search and Rescue crews, along with both the Vanderhoof and Fort St. James RCMP detachments and a number of concerned civilians, searched the area around Hogsback Lake last Sunday and Monday.
A Swift Water Rescue team was also called in to assist. More than 150 volunteers searched the area including shorelines, ATV trails and logging roads. The water was also scoured with boats equipped with underwater cameras and sonar’s.
The ground search was suspended last Tuesday pending new information.
Staff-Sergeant Dave Beach from the Vanderhoof RCMP said that the file was officially taken over by the North District Major Crime unit in Prince George last Monday because the file is too huge for the Vanderhoof detachment to handle and foul play is suspected.
He added that the police are continuing to search and that a underwater recovery team has been called in.
The RCMP Forensic Identification Section has also examined the camping area.
Police have conducted a number of interviews and have determined that there was another party held at Hogsback Lake on Saturday. The RCMP are asking to speak with anyone who may have attended either party or was in the area over the weekend.
“We believe someone who was in the area this weekend may have seen Madison or even spoken to her,” said Sgt. Rob Vermeulen, spokesperson with E Division, in a press release.
“It is important that we determine what happened that night, what her plans were for Saturday and the rest of the weekend. We have conducted some interviews, but it is important that we speak to anyone and everyone who will help piece together the bigger picture. We still have many questions as does Madison’s family”.
Rick Beatty, from Vanderhoof Search and Rescue, said the initial ground search was called off after no evidence was found to suggest she was in the area around the lake.
"There was nothing found and no evidence found to indicate that she had gone anywhere or been anyway and so basically we had no direction to go in," Beatty told Black Press last Wednesday.
"We just basically ran out of places to look," he added.
After the ground search was called off on Tuesday, Beatty continues to help out as a civilian, flying with one of the helicopter crews last Tuesday to aid the visual search.
"We conducted a thorough search of the area at that time right around the lake," said Beatty.
He added that he has flown the same area during a search and rescue training exercise last year, but in a six-wing aircraft.
During the exercise they were looking for two people.
"Literally last year we did a major exercise with civil air search and rescue people and our ground search and rescue people and the only reason we had any clue that they were even down there was they finally lit a fire to let us know where they were," he said.
He added that a helicopter is much better to carry out a search in than the aircraft they had been training in.
Beatty says that a lot of people who aided the search think that Scott left the site by vehicle.
"There's no evidence to suggest that she left by foot - there was no tracks anywhere - nothing. That's why we shut it down because there was just no place or direction left to go ... it almost looks to a lot of people like she left by vehicle," he said.
Despite the suspension of the initial ground search, family and friends of the Scott family have continued to mount an extensive search by land and air. On Thursday RCMP said that Search and Rescue will resume further searches of some roadways in the Hogsback Lake area over a number of days.
Interior helicopters in Fort St. James say they have had two machines out on the search last
Hannah Wright, Omineca Express