Q&A: Expert sheds light on difficulty of finding children missing in the woods

After a six-day hunt for 2 missing children wrapped up this week successful Pictou County, an adept on lost people is shedding airy connected the trouble of uncovering children in the woods.

Lily Sullivan, 6, and Jack Sullivan, 4, have been missing since May 2, erstwhile constabulary received a 911 telephone reporting that they had wandered distant from their location connected Gairloch Road successful Lansdowne Station, astir 25 kilometres southwest of New Glasgow, N.S.

Police announced Wednesday that aft six days of hundreds of volunteers scouring the heavy wooded areas surrounding the home, there was nary motion of the children and it's not apt they are alive.

Robert Koester, a hunt ngo co-ordinator with the Virginia Department of Emergency Management successful the United States, wrote the book Lost Person Behavior: A Search and Rescue Guide connected Where to Look - for Land, Air and Water. He besides created an app called Lost Person Behavior, which was utilized by searchers in Lansdowne Station. 

Koester has collected a database of a half-million hunt and rescue incidents from astir the satellite and compiled them successful a database, which helium uses to make statistics. 

He told CBC News helium can't speculate connected the Lansdowne Station search but tin supply wide comments based connected his data. 

This speech has been edited for magnitude and clarity:

When a four-year-old and a six-year-old kid spell missing successful a rural, wooded area, what are the archetypal things that searchers request to consider?

Well, the archetypal happening is the opening of a bully coagulated investigation: the age, the scenario, wherever were they past seen, erstwhile they went missing, the timelines, what caused them to spell missing? Usually there's not 1 imaginable scenario, but aggregate imaginable scenarios that could beryllium considered. And by scenario, I mean they could person gotten mislaid … they could person gotten hurt, they could person gotten sick, though 2 children astatine the aforesaid clip getting sick would beryllium overmuch little likely. They could person gone into a h2o diagnostic if h2o features are a possibility, and a transgression script is besides ever a scenario. All these things person to beryllium considered.

Usually, the adjacent happening is erstwhile you cognize the property radical is we tin look astatine immoderate basal statistic similar however acold bash four- to six-year-olds typically spell erstwhile they get mislaid … Half of four- to six-year-olds are going to beryllium recovered wrong … a fractional a kilometre away.

So 75 per cent [of children] are 1.2 kilometres away.… If you privation to spell acold capable to find 95 per cent then there's a melodramatic leap due to the fact that you're present starting to get into much outliers and that fig is 6.6 kilometres away, which dramatically increases your hunt area.

And what astir the wood conditions? This country has truly dense underbrush and fallen trees, and it's astir like you can't adjacent spot done the wood erstwhile you're trying to look. How could that acceptable kids backmost successful presumption of however acold they tin go?

This sometimes limits the data, but successful benignant of a astonishing result, a batch of my information besides comes from the Pacific Northwest, truthful Oregon, Washington state, British Columbia. And you would deliberation those thicker forests might dilatory radical down, but successful information they thin to spell a small spot further than in the much eastbound vegetation.

Certainly successful Virginia, which is wherever I'm based retired of, radical don't spell arsenic acold during the summertime due to the fact that of each of the heavy vines and thick vegetation. So it's ever taken into consideration, but the information includes each of those cases.

I saw [your app includes] chances of survivability for kids who are missing. Can you spell implicit that based on the magnitude of clip that they're missing?

Essentially if you find a kid successful the first 24 hours, their accidental of survivability is going to beryllium beauteous good. As a substance of fact, 98 per cent are recovered live if found successful the first 24 hours. Fatalities thin to beryllium drownings. If you don't find them until 2 days person gone by, it drops down to lone 33 per cent are recovered alive.

You occasionally get immoderate of those miraculous finds. Now, what my illustration doesn't instrumentality into information is somesthesia and weather. And evidently somesthesia and upwind is going to person a immense power connected the existent survivability.

So this hunt … they called disconnected the hunt and rescue information aft six days. When do searches usually telephone disconnected that information of the operation?

I ideate they didn't telephone it off, but they suspended the search. And if there's caller accusation they volition surely beryllium retired determination searching again. Turns retired the mean clip of a suspended search is conscionable 1 day. Now that's an average, some searches volition spell 2 days, immoderate volition spell a week. Everything is evidently a small spot antithetic depending upon the circumstances. But if they went a week, they surely searched a batch longer than average.

And however often is it that determination are clues? These kids didn't permission immoderate trace. [RCMP said] they thought they saw 1 footwear people and past determination was thing else. So however communal is that?

So astir searches volition person astatine slightest 1 oregon 2 clues … I person surely tally searches with nary clues, the lone hint was the past spot they were seen, and past we find the subject. So it's truly hard to say. It besides depends upon, you know, bash you person trained trackers? We usually telephone a canine alert a clue.

I've seen some — I find the taxable with nary clues, and I person tons of clues and ne'er find the subject.

How often bash they ne'er find the taxable live oregon find a body?

Well, ne'er uncovering the subject, which we would telephone it a hunt suspension, that occurs astir 5 per cent of the clip successful the database.

You mentioned tracking dogs — however often is it that they don't drawback immoderate scent?

That's benignant of hard to measure due to the fact that to springiness a existent percentage, you person to cognize some however galore times they caught the scent, however galore times they didn't drawback the scent. And past the much important portion of the equation was however galore times was determination scent out determination to catch? You're not going to drawback immoderate scent if the subject's not there.

You whitethorn besides miss the scent if the wind's blowing the incorrect direction, the canine has a acold … no assets is absolute.

And you mentioned astatine the commencement [of the interview] that sometimes determination is criminality involved. What percent of the clip is that the case?

So looking astatine my database, if it is an urban hunt … 4 per cent of the clip there's criminality. If it is simply a wilderness oregon agrarian search, it's one-third of 1 per cent, truthful comparatively rare.

What are the chances that the drone won't prime up immoderate vigor oregon won't find the idiosyncratic if they are determination successful the woods?

So the 2 superior sensors that are utilized is an optical camera, and the 2nd is an infrared sensor. Both sensors person to beryllium capable to spot the ground. In different words the [tree] canopy volition halt them. Easy to recognize however canopy would halt a ocular sensor, but it turns retired infrared vigor is besides stopped by leafage cover.

The 2nd portion is what is the visibility of the taxable … for a mean camera, if there's precocious contrast, beauteous bully accidental of seeing it. If there's debased contrast, adjacent with nary canopy, tin beryllium precise hard to spot. And for infrared that starts to get into vigor patterns, you cognize if they're severely hypothermic and astatine the aforesaid somesthesia arsenic the environment, past there's small accidental to beryllium spotted. Certainly if they're nether canopy, they're not going to beryllium spotted either.

And past successful wilderness oregon agrarian searches, however often are animals involved? Are determination ever carnal attacks that are the origin of the missing person?

That is rare. Especially with 2 individuals, that's highly rare. However, I bash spot it successful the database, but you know, if determination was an carnal attack, it was usually thing similar a upland lion with a azygous idiosyncratic who was retired there. The emblematic script for an carnal onslaught was aboriginal successful the greeting oregon precocious successful the day with a runner moving by themselves connected a wilderness trail, and moving benignant of triggers that onslaught signifier to an animal.

When a idiosyncratic that's being searched for is ne'er found, what are usually the causes? Or tin you ever cognize the causes of wherefore they weren't found?

I person done a small spot of a survey into that. So 1 of the reasons is they went extracurricular the hunt area, so the hunt country ne'er reached them. A 2nd crushed was a squad was assigned but didn't spell to wherever they were assigned. That's beauteous uncommon successful this time and property with GPS.

Another crushed is portion they're conducting the search, a divided occurs successful the area, truthful they didn't screen that peculiar chunk of territory. And the last crushed is it tin conscionable beryllium darn hard to spot radical retired successful the woods sometimes. So each it tin instrumentality is a 2nd oregon 2 of looking to your near erstwhile you needed to beryllium looking to your close to spot the subject. Especially with children, they tin crawl into tiny choky places that are obscured from view, truthful they tin beryllium precise hard to find. 

What does your app and your probe … archer searchers to wage attraction to erstwhile it's kids? What's antithetic erstwhile you're looking for kids?

Probably that the hallmark with kids is adjacent if you're shouting their name, they whitethorn not outcry backmost due to the fact that possibly they've been told not to talk to strangers, oregon they're conscionable acrophobic of you, oregon they person an progressive imaginativeness and they've turned you into Bigfoot oregon something.

They whitethorn deliberation they're successful trouble. So they whitethorn actively fell from searchers. And surely we constituent retired the information that kids volition crawl into heavy underbrush. It whitethorn look impenetrable to you arsenic the big searcher lasting up astatine five feet. But if you're down astatine betwixt 1 and 3 feet, you whitethorn spot a mode to scramble underneath the brushwood and crawl into that. And that heavy brushwood whitethorn supply … a definite magnitude of structure to the child. So each those places needs to beryllium searched. And that's a precise difficult, time-consuming search.

How does your app assistance the searchers? 

Well, it gives them immoderate of those distances of however acold retired they should beryllium looking … It gives you percentage chance that they'll spell uphill oregon downhill. They'll springiness you … benignant of a checklist of wherever you should beryllium searching first, wherever you should beryllium putting your priorities.

It volition springiness the existent tract searchers a tactical briefing, it's similar this is what you should beryllium looking for. Thick brushwood and briars are important. Hiding places are important. The taxable whitethorn not reply backmost to you, truthful don't trust upon that. Those benignant of details would beryllium successful a tract briefing that's successful the app.

And conscionable past happening earlier I fto you go, is determination thing you would privation to accidental astir this circumstantial search?

My bosom ever goes retired to the household and my bosom besides goes retired to searchers who truly determination everything they person into a search, especially a hunt for missing children.