Juan de Fuca Search and Rescue Historical Archive1948–2026

Home → Timeline → this article

Calls for help, remote work become easier as cell towers arrive for Sooke-Port Renfrew

Times Colonist13 September 2022p. A1JDF SAR era

Times Colonist, p. A1, 13 September 2022 ref-only

Summary

"It can't come soon enough," said Karl Ablack, president of the Port Renfrew Chamber of Commerce. "There are a lot of people anxiously waiting to have that [service]." The provincial government announced in April 2021 that the infrastructure for cellular service would be in place by October 2021 to provide the wireless service so desperately needed by residents, search-and-rescue operators and the thousands who use the trails and beaches along the Juan de Fuca Marine Trail. Mike Hicks, who represents the Juan de Fuca Electoral Area for the Capital Regional District, said zoning for all seven tower sites was approved early last year, but the project had seen frustrating delays. The sites are backed with emergency generators because the system is remote; unlike urban cellular systems, which can leapfrog to other towers in the event of failures, remote systems do not have backups.

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“Calls for help, remote work become easier as cell towers arrive for Sooke-Port Renfrew”
Not recorded in the catalogue — read from the clipping image. Check it against the clipping below before quoting it.
PublicationTimes Colonist
Date13 September 2022
PageA1
EraJDF SAR era
Document typenews report
Original articleProQuest — the scanned page in the Times Colonist digital archive ↗
SourceProQuest Digital Times Colonist via GVPL (bulk export 2026-07-16)
Accessed2026-07-16
Licensingref-only
Record confidenceprobable

Archivist's note

The infrastructure story behind a decade of incidents in this archive. The 2015 Sombrio grotto search, the 2018 Sombrio cliff fall and the 2021 kayak search all turn on the same fact — that there is no cellphone coverage between Sooke and Port Renfrew, so help is summoned by someone hiking or driving out. Mike Hicks also appears in the 2013 CRD building coverage held here. 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.

The clipping

Scan of Times Colonist, page A1, 13 September 2022 — 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

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

Files

Full page scan (PDF)

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. Recovered from page 54 of the bulk export. Weber is named but her quotation was not legible in the recovered text.

Record id 2022-09-13-times-colonist-pa1-weber-on-cellphone-reliance. Original file in the project archive: 02_articles/2026-07-16_proquest_bulk_export_50_articles_2012-2026.pdf (page 54).

Explore onward

In the timeline

  • 13 September 2022"It can't come soon enough," said Karl Ablack, president of the Port Renfrew Chamber of Commerce.

People named

Places

Topics