MONTREAL - South American authorities scoured the Pacific Ocean on Monday for a sailboat carrying at least one Canadian that has not been heard from since a powerful earthquake struck Chile more than a week ago.
Montrealer Martin Neufeld has been scrambling to gather information about his wife, Josee (Jade) Chabot, who set sail on the SS Columbia in January to learn how to be a skipper.
"The mind's going a thousand miles a hour and I'm looking at all options and grasping at straws," Neufeld said Monday in an interview from Thailand.
"I just want to know, that's all."
The 13-metre boat pushed off from Salinas, Ecuador on Jan. 16 and was supposed to arrive in Coquimbo, Chile at the end of February.
On Feb. 27, the magnitude 8.8 quake and subsequent tsunami hammered towns and cities along a 700-kilometre stretch of Chile's Pacific coast.
Neufeld, who's been married to Chabot for three years, hopes the Columbia may have just run out of gas and is waiting for a big gust of wind.
But he also fears the boat may have been swept up in rough seas or even boarded by pirates, which he says have been reported off the coast in the past.
"I don't know if it's a better hope than them being drowned," he said of that possibility.
"I just want to take her in my arms and hold her, I want to look into her eyes and just see her smile."
Neufeld said a second Canadian woman, from British Columbia, and another seasoned sailor from Australia were also on the boat, along with captain Boguslaw Norwid and his wife.
He has been pleading with South American and Canadian authorities to look for the vessel, which is labelled "overdue" and won't be officially declared missing until Saturday.
Neufeld received word Monday that searchers from Chile and Ecuador started scanning the waves by boat and aircraft for the Columbia.
He believes the combined weight of the Canadian and Australian governments prompted local action and says he's grateful for the help.
"They're getting pressure from both governments now, from both ends of the world, so that's probably why they stepped up the search," he said.
An experienced sailor, Chabot took the journey to earn her skipper's licence. She had been bouncing around the idea of one day buying her own boat, so she could operate holistic sailing vacations off Ecuador.
Chabot has been a Reiki master for close to 15 years.
But a friend in Montreal said Chabot, who turns 50 at the end of the month, hesitated at first about hopping on board.
Ginette Beauchemin said Chabot's sailing voyage conflicted with plans to work with a shaman from Ecuador in February, so she nearly skipped the captain's course altogether.
"She just loves the sea, it was like a dream," said Beauchemin, who described Chabot as an avid traveller.
In a couple of December postings on her blog about the upcoming trip, Chabot wrote how a visit to the Columbia made her feel comfortable and safe.
She also expressed how she had made the right choice in signing up for the sailing adventure.
"A couple of conversations quickly made me realize that I am meant to get on that sail boat," she wrote.
"Once I took the decision, things cleared up, and I started to get really excited about the idea and old dreams resurfaced, showing me the possibilities that could come out of this experience."
