Juan de Fuca Search and Rescue Historical Archive1948–2026

The Archives · 1948–2026

For 78 years, when someone went missing on this coast, people went out to look for them.

This is an archive of 158 newspaper reports of search and rescue in the Sooke and Juan de Fuca region of Vancouver Island, from a 1948 hunt for a lost hunter in the Sooke Lake watershed to the 2026 reopening of the Juan de Fuca Marine Trail.

Start at the beginning How this archive was made

Where it happened

Every place the reporting names that could be located from an official gazetteer. Larger circles appear in more articles. Open the full map.

Sooke — 36 articlesJuan de Fuca Marine Trail Park — 33 articlesPort Renfrew — 20 articlesSooke Potholes Park — 17 articlesEast Sooke Regional Park — 15 articlesChina Beach — 12 articlesSombrio Beach — 12 articlesLangford — 11 articlesJordan River — 11 articlesSooke River — 10 articlesEast Sooke — 9 articlesSooke Hills — 8 articlesBear Beach — 8 articlesMystic Beach — 8 articlesVictoria — 6 articlesBotanical Beach — 6 articlesJuan de Fuca Electoral Area — 6 articlesCharters Creek — 5 articlesShirley — 5 articlesSooke Potholes Park — 5 articlesSaanich — 4 articlesSooke River Road — 4 articlesElla Beach — 4 articlesMetchosin — 3 articlesOtter Point — 3 articlesSooke Potholes Park — 3 articlesWye Lake — 3 articlesCabin Point — 3 articlesSugarloaf — 3 articlesBecher Bay — 3 articlesOtter Point Road — 3 articlesFairy Creek — 2 articlesLeechtown — 2 articlesWhiffin Spit — 2 articlesAylard Farm — 2 articlesDeertrail Resort ruins — 2 articlesHarbourview Road — 2 articlesHumpback Road — 2 articlesSheilds Lake — 2 articlesMacMillan Road — 2 articlesAnderson Cove — 1 articleColwood — 1 articleEsquimalt — 1 articleGlen Lake — 1 articleHarris Creek — 1 articleMcVicar Creek — 1 articleMuir Creek — 1 articleParkinson Creek — 1 articleProvidence Cove — 1 articleSaseenos — 1 articleShawnigan Lake — 1 articleSooke Lake — 1 articleSooke Lake — 1 articleSooke Mountain Park — 1 articleAlligator Creek — 1 articleGoldstream Park — 1 articleBoneyard Lake — 1 articlePayzant Creek — 1 articleSheringham Point — 1 articleChin Beach — 1 articleGalloping Goose Regional Trail — 1 articleGillespie Road — 1 articleHighway 14 (West Coast Road) — 1 articleMount Wells Regional Park — 1 articlePike Road — 1 articleSeagirt Road — 1 articleSooke Business Park — 1 articleSooke Mountain — 1 articleSea to Sea Regional Park — 1 articleLittle Kuitshe Creek campsite — 1 articleCarpenter Road — 0 articlesCharters River Salmon Interpretive Centre — 0 articlesSookeJuan de Fuca Marine Trail ParkPort RenfrewSooke Potholes ParkEast Sooke Regional ParkChina BeachSombrio BeachLangfordJordan RiverSooke RiverEast SookeSooke HillsBear BeachMystic Beach

Coastline, trails and watercourses © OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL. 45 coordinates from BC Geographical Names, 27 from OpenStreetMap, 1 from local knowledge. 9 places lie beyond the edges of this map.

Every way in

Events, incidents, people, places, topics, publications, name changes and open research questions — every way of slicing the archive.

Reading this archive fairly

The summaries come from the articles and nothing else. Anything that compares sources, notes a contradiction or supplies context sits in a separately marked archivist's note.

Scans marked ref-only are copyright to their publishers. They are here for reference and fair-dealing quotation, not for reproduction.

Building this archive involved AI assistance — reading scans, drafting summaries and citations, and generating the site — instructed throughout to stick to the facts in front of it and never invent. Read more about how.