Missing N.W.T. hunter lit fire to attract attention of helicopter searchers

After five days alone in the bush, hearing searchers and planes come close but not finding him, a missing N.W.T. hunter lit a fire to alert searchers to his location.

• VIDEO|N.W.T. hunter Lanny Stewart, missing since Monday, found safe

Lanny Stewart left the James Creek Camp near Fort McPherson, N.W.T., around 9:30 a.m. on Labour Day but when when he failed to return by suppertime, a search was begun.

The search was initially hampered by blowing snow and on Friday, RCMP said the search was being scaled back, though community volunteers continued looking for Stewart.

Saturday evening, a helicopter helping with the search was doing one last run. Wanda Pascal, chief of the Tetlit Gwich'in Council in Fort McPherson, said the sound of the chopper drew Stewart from where he had taken shelter in a creek bed.

'To hell with this, I'm getting out of here'

"He told us that he heard that helicopter and he thought: 'to hell with this, I'm getting out of here,' and he crawled up that creek bank," she said. "He found dry grass and he lit that on fire... That's how they seen him."

The helicopter picked him up and took him to a muster station at kilometre 36 of the Dempster Highway, where Pascal and others were waiting.

"I just couldn't believe my eyes," she said.

She said he appeared weak and cold but otherwise uninjured. RCMP say Stewart declined medical assistance.

Pascal thanked volunteers from neighbouring communities of Fort Good Hope, Aklavik and Tsiigehtchic, N.W.T., and Old Crow, Yukon, for their help, adding that aid was even offered from people in Whitehorse, about 1,000 km away by road.