Marine search and rescue units and Nanaimo RCMP are trying to determine what happened to the person or persons aboard a sailing boat that was spotted adrift in the waters off Nanaimo.
Marine search and rescue units responded to a report from the Canadian Coast Guard Joint Response Coordination Centre of the 30-foot sailboat Gypsy Soul that was apparently abandoned and adrift in the Strait of Georgia off Neck Point on Thursday, May 15.
Russell Berg, spokesperson for the Royal Canadian Search and Rescue Station Unit No. 27 in Nanaimo, said coast guard units were called out at 2 p.m.
“There was a sailboat that appeared to be adrift with no one on it north of Neck Point,” Berg said. “Our crew responded and found the vessel run aground with nobody on it and it was evident that it wasn’t just a boat that had slipped off an anchor.”
Upon hearing this, the JRCC called out marine search and rescue units from French Creek, Canadian Coast Guard Cape Cockburn and CCGS Siyay hovercraft, and a search and rescue helicopter from Comox. Berg said those crews searched for the rest of the day until about 11 p.m., but did not find anyone. Cellular phones that were left onboard the sailboat.
“The working hypothesis is that someone was onboard who perhaps fell overboard,” he said. “We don’t really know. We don’t know how many people were on there, We don’t know if there were any people on there, but there’s indication that there was.”
The search resumed at 8 a.m. Friday, May 16.
“We keep searching as long as JRCC asks us to keep searching,” Berg said. “They are the ones who ultimately decide how long this continues.”
Ladysmith RCM SAR No. 29 towed the boat to the Nanaimo boat basin where it is currently tied up.
Reserve Const. Gary O’Brien, Nanaimo RCMP spokesperson, said police have taken on the case as a missing persons investigation and are now looking for 34-year-old Amber Nitchman. Police are not saying, at this point, where she is from other than to say she is not a Nanaimo resident.
"There's indication that [the boat] had been moored in the Ladysmith area, but registered to a different owner," O'Brien said. "Nitchman is now the recent owner, but we don't whether she has any contact with the Ladysmith area. We don't know what brought the boat there. We don't have any travel plans. A lot of questions remain and that's what we're hoping to find."
Nanaimo RCMP have provided an image of the missing person and the sailboat. Anyone who knows the person's whereabouts is asked to call the RCMP's non-emergency line at 250-754-2345 and refer to file No. 2025-14534.
