By NanaimoNewsNOW Staff

NNN’s top 10 of 2017: Spencer Hunt survives 45 hours lost near Ammonite Falls

Dec 29, 2017 | 3:28 PM

NANAIMO — “He’s lucky to be alive.”

Perhaps the understatement of the year.

Nanaimo’s Benson Creek Falls Regional Park played host to an incredible rescue and certainly one of the most notable stories of 2017.

20-year-old Spencer Hunt became separated from his family while heading out for a hike to Ammonite Falls from the Jameson Rd. trailhead in the afternoon on Jan. 28.

What developed over the next 45 hours before he was found can be described as an absolute spectacle.

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Search and Rescue teams from around the mid-island hit the trails on Saturday evening. Late Saturday night there was nothing but a mobile command centre in the parking lot near the trailhead and barely a sign of any other activity as crews scoured the bush.

By Sunday afternoon, Jameson Rd. was lined with more than 60 cars. There was a base camp style setup of tents and tables covered in food as Hunt’s family members gathered anxiously awaiting word on his whereabouts. Volunteers from the surrounding area turned up in the dozens on everything from ATVs to horseback to join the search for the young man no one seemed to know but all wanted to find.

Search crews were called in from as far away as the Lower Mainland and hundreds of square kilometres were combed. 

Still no sign of Spencer Hunt.

As nightfall hit Sunday, deep concern could be seen on the faces of family members despite best efforts to remain positive.

Hunt had no supplies, no food or water and was wearing only a hoodie. There had been rain and overnight temperatures hovered around freezing. Snow lay on the frozen ground at the trailhead.

Even the most positive people feared the worst as the sun came up Monday.

Then a miraculous call. Hunt had been spotted waving up at a helicopter from a deep ravine about 2.5 km southwest of the Jameson Rd. trailhead. He was in good spirits and, despite being hungry and cold, was uninjured.

“In B.C., many victims last 24 hours in the wilderness. Hypothermia is the number one killer out here and he beat the odds,” Paul Berry Comox Valley Ground SAR search commander said.

Hunt told rescuers he had slept under a stump to stay warm and only really became concerned after spending a full day in the woods with no sign of anyone else.

Truly an incredible tale of survival and a community banding together to support a family and reconnect them with their boy.

This story came in at number 4 on our top 10 list of biggest stories we covered this year. NanaimoNewsNOW is counting down our top 10 local stories of 2017, with the top two stories named on New Year’s Eve. Be sure to check back and offer your thoughts on the biggest stories of 2017.

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