Like a small village’s fire brigade, a select few compelled by a moral obligation could usually be counted on to help with the gruesome task. Using their own dive gear, they were willing to serve their community beyond the call of duty. Historically, diving operations involving body or evidence recovery was undertaken ‘unofficially’ and voluntarily by any police officer, first responder, or civilian who owned a tank of compressed air. Whatever their specific mission is, the mandate of the RCMP Underwater Recovery Team (URT) is exactly as their name implies: a unit trained to conduct evidence recovery operations beneath the surface of the water. It may involve the recovery of large vehicles, aircrafts, and sunken vessels, or supporting protective details by clearing, piers, jetties and the hulls of ships for terrorism threats. The nature of their tasks are diverse: from search and recover operations of tiny bone fragments in contaminated sloughs, to bullets and weapons in four feet (1.2m) of silt at the bottom of a deep, dark cold lake. Not only have they brought closure to many families and friends, they have been instrumental in providing a forensic service for many serious criminal investigations, like the infamous Pickton pig farm murder investigation. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police Underwater Recovery Team-dubbed ‘URT Members’ by their badge-carrying colleagues-has embraced this new era of diving sciences, subsequently earning a reputation as one of the most competent and qualified police dive units in North America. Subsea technology and diver training have evolved tremendously over the last three decades, advancing underwater forensics to new levels. Regardless, closure for the families and friends of these victims is pivotal. Sometimes their demise is a result of nefarious behaviour sometimes it is accidental. Photos: RCMP / URTĮvery year, for one reason or another, many people succumb to the watery depths of a cold Canadian lake or one of our oceans. Add a diver’s psyche to the mix and you have an Underwater Recovery Team prepared to take on any challenge this country’s harsh environment poses. Canadians, however, are a hardy and resilient folk and Mounties always get their man. Overcoming the logistics to successfully undertake any kind of large-scale search and recovery operation in turbulent lake waters, isolated in the rugged wilderness of Saskatchewan, normally would have been inconceivable. The strong winds and the lake’s long fetch combine to generate waves four feet high or more (1.2m+) throughout the summer. Peter Pond Lake is one of the largest and most exposed bodies of water in the province. The real difficult work, however, had yet to come. The team, using a remotely operated vehicle equipped with a video camera, confirmed the plane’s final resting spot. Sixty years later, a side-scan sonar image of a target matching the plane brought a Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) dive unit back to the area. With little information to go on, the search to locate the aircraft was eventually abandoned, leaving many with questions as to what happened and some still looking for closure. The plane crashed somewhere in the middle of Peter Pond Lake, a remote area in the northern part of the province. In 1959 a Conservation Officer and his pilot were flying to La Loche, Saskatchewan in a Cessna 180 when something went wrong. Specialized in technical, commercial, public safety diving, and underwater investigavite procedures, the RCMP’s Underwater Recovery Team always gets their man
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