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Search called off for man whose rented motorhome was found abandoned

Times Colonist2 November 2021p. A3JDF SAR era

Times Colonist, p. A3, 2 November 2021 ref-only

Summary

The search at China Beach was called off and police said on the Monday there were no new leads. Vickie Weber of Juan de Fuca Search and Rescue said efforts to locate 70-year-old Jean-Michel Cabanes were unsuccessful over the weekend: "We did not locate him. [It was] a very hard day for the [team]." Weber said the area has "treacherous terrain" with cliffs and ravines, and that a storm packing rain and strong winds the previous week had felled trees and branches and made ocean waves dangerous. "It's an area where people can easily get turned around. Search and rescue has been called to this area many, many times," Weber said in a message [to the paper]. Cabanes had picked up a rental motorhome in Saanich that was due to be returned on 26 October, with plans to travel around the Island, but failed to return it or to board his flight home to Montreal.

Written from the article text only. Where the scan is hard to read, the summary was taken from the page image rather than the OCR.

Details

Headline	“Search called off for man whose rented motorhome was found abandoned” Not recorded in the catalogue — read from the clipping image. Check it against the clipping below before quoting it.
Publication	Times Colonist
Date	2 November 2021
Page	A3
Era	JDF SAR era
Document type	news report
Original article	ProQuest — the scanned page in the Times Colonist digital archive ↗
Source	ProQuest Digital Times Colonist via GVPL (bulk export 2026-07-16)
Accessed	2026-07-16
Licensing	ref-only
Record confidence	confirmed

Archivist's note

The most candid statement by a team member anywhere in the archive about the cost of an unsuccessful search — "a very hard day for the team". It sits alongside the 2020 Sooke News Mirror profile, in which Weber speaks about the toll of body recoveries, as the two documents that record what this work costs the people who do it. This page was recovered from inside the ProQuest bulk export already held in the archive, where it had been listed as referenced but not held. Spelling verified against the page image on 2026-08-06: this article prints "Cabanes", the same as the Oct. 31 report; the "Cabunes" reading was an OCR artifact. As of the same date no public report records Mr. Cabanes having been found; the search was suspended in November 2021 with no new leads.

The clipping

Scan of Times Colonist, page A3, 2 November 2021 — the full page, shown because the article region could not be verified — The full page. The article region could not be verified automatically, so the whole page is shown rather than risk a clipping that cuts off the article. the whole page is shown; the article region within it has not been isolated.

Read the original online

ProQuest — the scanned page in the Times Colonist digital archive ↗ subscription or library card
Recorded exactly as captured, including the Greater Victoria Public Library proxy address — it needs a GVPL card or a ProQuest subscription. Without one, search ProQuest for the document ID in the address.
This link opens through the Greater Victoria Public Library and asks for a library card number before showing the page. Cards are free for Greater Victoria residents — sign up on the GVPL site; an online temporary card is enough for the digital databases. Outside Greater Victoria, ask your own library whether it offers the ProQuest Times Colonist archive.
http://search.proquest.com.proxy.gvpl.ca/pdntimescolonist/newspapers/november-22021-page-a3/docview/2597601533/sem-2?accountid=6051

These links leave this archive and point at the publisher. They may change or disappear — the scan held here is the archival copy.

Files

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Archive notes

This is a full newspaper page and carries unrelated stories as well as the article summarised here. The text is the OCR made from the ProQuest bulk export during the 2026 research phase, not a fresh pass. SENSITIVE: the subject was not found. Recovered from page 60 of the bulk export. CORRECTION 2026-08-06: the page image was read directly and this article prints the surname "Cabanes" — in the body text and in the photo caption — matching the report two days earlier. The previously recorded "Cabunes" was an artifact of the bulk-export OCR. See conflicts.md C-32.

Record id 2021-11-02-times-colonist-pa3-cabunes-motorhome-search. Original file in the project archive: 02_articles/2026-07-16_proquest_bulk_export_50_articles_2012-2026.pdf (page 60).

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In the timeline

31 October 2021Search and rescue crews resumed a search on the Saturday for a missing Montreal man whose rented motorhome was