The search for a man missing since Tuesday has been bolstered by more than 100 hundred volunteers.
Searchers came from as far away as Saskatoon to help locate Ernest Severight, who fell into the Assiniboine River while attempting to cross the Kamsack Dam. Stephane Keshane, who was with Severight when he fell, says he held onto a nearby log for about 20 minutes.
Keshane rushed to save the 30-year-old father of four, but she also fell.
“The current was starting to twist and take me down to the bottom and Ernest was already gone,” she said.
The remaining friends were able to pull Keshane out of the water with a garden hose, but Severight is still missing and is presumed dead.
The RCMP have conducted an extensive search of the area but have been unable to locate him. The police service said in a statement that the search is ongoing, and that it has been hampered by “strong currents and poor visibility under water.”
Severight’s family and friends have not left the riverside since Severight disappeared on Tuesday evening. After a video was posted to Facebook that showed Severight’s family members expressing anger with the amount of time that the RCMP spent searching on Saturday morning, around a hundred people showed up to continue the search.
“We came from Saskatoon…we just came to help with drone assistance,” said Dre Roberts.
In addition to drones, horses and privately-owned boats were used to search the river. Many people used sticks to dredge the water.
Alvin Severight is Ernest’s uncle. He says that he will continue looking until they find his nephew.
“We're going to start walking the banks tomorrow. We're going to go in pairs and see if we can find him,” he said.
“We want to bring closure to this,” said George Cote, Chief of Cote First Nation and one of the organizers of the search.
“He was a really good friend and I’m really sorry that we lost him,” said Keshane.
“And I just hope to god we find him soon."
