Searchers drag Winnipeg River for missing Sagkeeng snowmobilers

The Sagkeeng Fire Department and volunteers are searching the Winnipeg River for a young man and woman who disappeared while attempting to snowmobile across it last week.

"We've been dragging the river ever since they went down. We went out the next day and we're going to go as long as we can before it freezes over," said Lincoln Bruyere, a firefighter.

The two missing community members are believed to have been travelling from the south to north shore of the Winnipeg River behind the Sagkeeng Arena late Tuesday when they went through the ice.

RCMP were called around 11:45 p.m. and with fire and safety officers and volunteers, they searched the area until the early morning hours but couldn't locate the pair.

Bruyere said they're searching all areas of open water along the river, which flows northwest to Lake Winnipeg.

"It's been going all right. We've been going and we're probably not going to give up until we find something. We found a skidoo, we do believe it's the skidoo. We keep hooking it, but it keeps coming off," Bruyere said.

He said he was the first one on the ice the night the two disappeared after they were dispatched by RCMP. He and others scoured the shoreline for tracks and ventured as far as they could onto the ice, but it was too dangerous to go all the way out, he said.

"We tried to do our best to save them but it was too late."