The parents of a 29-year-old Campbell River man who was missing for three days in the Horne Lake area are sending a grateful shout-out to those who helped search for him.
Nicole and Andre Kirchner said Monday their son Jordan remains in Nanaimo General Hospital where he is receiving treatment for dehydration and scratches on his hands, legs and torso.
Jordan Kirchner became the focus of a large-scale search after suffering what his parents believe was a psychotic episode following rock-climbing in Horne Lake on Tuesday (Aug.27) afternoon. He was last seen running into the bushes when he fled from a vehicle on Tuesday around 6 p.m.
As a former mine worker involved in a rescue team, Andre says he understands and appreciates how much effort RCMP, search volunteers and friends and family put forward from that Tuesday night until Friday afternoon (Aug.30) when Jordan was finally located.
“This is a new lease on life for our son obviously, the support that we got from all the RCMP, the media, the people that lived around Horne Lake, all the search and rescue, you don’t really realize how much you need this,” Andre says.
”We wanted to say thank you to all these people because they don’t get the credit for what they did, yea it’s one boy out of how many people and they were looking for our son who they don’t even know. I just can’t say enough” he adds.
The Kirchners had joined the efforts of more than 80 volunteer searchers to look along roads, trails and bushes throughout the Horne Lake area and it was while Nicole and a girlfriend were searching by vehicle that Jordan was discovered.
They were driving along a hatchery road in the area and had passed a point where his last footprint had been sighted when she said she "had a feeling."
"I almost thought about keeping driving and then something in me said just stop, take a look; what the heck,” she says.
Nicole and her friend exited the vehicle and were on foot calling for him when she heard ‘here’ in reply from a ditch on the side of the road.
”At first I didn’t know if I was hearing things because I wanted to hear it so I screamed again: 'Jordan' and he’s like ‘I’m here’ so I went running over to him and he was laying in the ditch.”
She says he was covered in the ditch and because of his mental state may not have wanted to be discovered by anyone but she’s grateful he responded to her voice.
Early in the search efforts Jordan’s parents became concerned that because of his state, their son would possibly avoid rescuers believing they would bring harm to him.
Nicole is unsure if it was a case of being in the right place at the right time to save her son.
“I think sometime after we passed him the first time and came back he made the conscious decision that this time he was going to call out and whatever that little voice said 'okay it’s time for me to go to be with mom and dad and family and friends' he just made that decision,” she says.
Nicole says she found her son was barefoot and his feet were severely bruised and possibly blistered.
The pair says their son’s recovery will be a long road.
”There’s been a lot of physical stress that he’s gone through as well as emotional and medical so we’re looking at we don’t know how long, it’s just going to be a long road,” Nicole says.
The couple are grateful to everyone who assisted throughout the search efforts and say they will find a way to give back to the search groups with Andre contemplating even joining one of the groups as a way to pay their gratitude forward to others.
