Underwater experts to join Ness Lake search

Underwater search specialists Gene and Sandy Ralston will be coming to Prince George to assist in the search for a missing boater on Ness Lake.

Gene Ralston said the Idaho couple, who are experts in the field of underwater imaging using technology like side-scanning sonar, will arrive "sometime in the middle of next week."

"The RCMP have not given us a lot of information yet, but they appear to have a pretty good idea of the place [the boater] was last seen," Ralston said.

On July 17, a 29-year-old Prince George resident dove from a boat on the lake to reach his young son who was swimming with flotation device but had drifted a short distance away.

The man and a friend were able to get the child back in the boat, but the father - who wasn't wearing a floatation device - sank under water and didn't resurface.

RCMP have withheld the name of the missing man at the request of his family.

Witnesses, Prince George Search and Rescue and the RCMP's Underwater Recovery team conducted searches of the lake and area but were not unable to locate him.

A spokesperson for the RCMP could not be reached as of press time to confirm police have contacted the Ralstons to assist in the search.

However on Thursday police announced the decision to postpone the search until "conditions improve or other arrangements can be made," RCMP spokesperson Cpl. Craig Douglass said.

The Ralstons have assisted the RCMP with underwater searches in northern B.C. before. They assisted in the recovery of Ralph Der's body from Carp Lake in 2012 and the search for Syd Neville in Francois Lake in 2013, which located the body of John Angus Mowat who had drowned in 1984.

The Ralstons operate Ralston and Associates, a water sciences company that typically works for industry and government on various projects from fish inventories to water quality surveys to environmental permit verifications.

However, they have also used their sophisticated technology to assist in the recovery of more than 85 submerged bodies across North America.

- With files from Charelle Evelyn, Frank Peebles